Airbender's Child: Water
by SCWLC
Summary: Zuko's father was always disappointed his son wasn't a good enough firebender. His mother was disappointed he was a firebender at all. AU. Part one of a trilogy continued in Airbender's Child: Earth.
1. Prologue

Title: Airbender's Child

Author: SCWLC

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Summary: Zuko's father was always disappointed his son wasn't a good enough firebender. His mother was disappointed he was a firebender at all. AU.

Author's Notes: Those reading this prologue may recognise the setup of the Airbenders from my previous _Avatar_ series, "Proposal", et al. That's because the situation with the Air Nomads was actually borrowed from this previously unposted bunny. I don't know how quickly this will go, certainly it will be scads slower than the last _Avatar _series I did. However, I wanted to toss the prologue out just to get things started.

This will be a series rewrite, Zutara (although that isn't my intended focus at this time), and I'm going to be giving you a lot of, "So the episode happened pretty much the same but there was an extra person there, just go with it," notes along the way. I'm really not feeling like an itemised redo of the whole series, because I've done it with single episodes in _Buffy_ before, and it's just too big a project for me to wrap my head around.

I will now repeat, I honestly have no intention of doing this even one tenth as fast as I did the other series. So don't expect the next part any time at all soon.

* * *

There had been a few constants throughout Zuko's childhood. The first, was that his sisters were always better than him at anything that counted. The second, was that his uncle Iroh was the only adult that seemed to care for him, personally, rather than for what he was. The third was that both his parents only gave him any sort of approval or affection in front of an audience. What defined an audience was different for the two, but it remained a fact.

Prince Ozai, even before he ascended to the throne as Fire Lord, had always been publicly pleased with his son, as long as the boy was doing visibly better at his studies and bending than the other children his own age. Privately was another matter. In front of the family, he made sure to tell his son that the boy was inadequate because he was not a firebending prodigy like his sister. Better than average was not enough. He was supposed to be better than the average prodigy.

It never mattered when his sword instructors told his father that the young prince was a swordfighting prodigy, or that his history and calligraphy instructors declared him to have covered everything they had wished to teach him that year in the space of a few short months. All that mattered was that the boy's firebending, so important to the throne of the Fire Nation, fell below the level desired by his father.

Lady Ursa was another matter. She had taken command of her son at a young age, grooming him for a difficult task. She had terrified him as a very young child with tales of airbenders and how they had been massacred a hundred years before. It had been her insurance that he would never tell the secrets she told him to anyone.

She was an airbender.

A hundred years before, the Air Nomads had scattered, fleeing for their lives. The masters were lost, killed in the genocide. The temples were sacked and all that had been left were small, scattered pockets of untrained air benders, teaching themselves how to bend. Ursa was of the small community that hid amidst the Fire Nation's islands, born and raised to marry high in the Fire Nation elite and use that position to help hide and protect her people. She could misdirect orders, delay searches, send warnings to the other people of Air descent and find ways to protect them from the Fire Lord's searches and purges. The last had been a mere forty years before when a small community on the Earth Kingdom mainland had been incautious.

Ursa's first child by Ozai was reputed to have been stillborn, but she had managed to have the child spirited away before anyone realised the girl had been born an airbender. Zuko grew up knowing of his older sister, and knowing that he could never be as good a person as her, or as kind, gracious or skilled at anything, because he was a firebender, and thus his father's son. She was always kind to him in front of others, but once they were alone, the gloves would come off. He almost grew to hate those days she petted him and made much of him in front of Azula. It was a lie, and his younger sister hated him for taking away an affection that didn't exist from her.

Lady Ursa had often taken him with her, ostensibly to visit her family, but really it was to ensure that his father's indoctrination on the superiority of the element of fire had no chance to take hold against the words and history of horror told to the children of air. He learned there to control his flame to the point that he could create gusts of hot air.

He learned to bend it.

But he was a firebender, not an airbender, and there were things the other children could do that he could not. None of them knowing he was the Crown Prince, Zuko soon had a reputation among the air children as being Lee, the weakest, slowest, least-skilled bender of them all. They laughed at him, kept him from their games, and the only friend he ever found in the enclave was a single young sky bison heifer.

She had been born prematurely, was small for her age and wasn't expected to survive, so Zuko got the privilege of naming her. Against all odds, she thrived, and Zuko learned ways to sneak out of the palace to see his furry, only, friend who followed him back to the palace once she'd learnt to fly.

When Zuko was nine, his mother was forced to kill Fire Lord Azulon to keep the son she'd been grooming to be the next Fire Lord. She left him a letter, explaining everything, reminding him that it had not been done out of affection, but because there was a practical need for him to ascend the throne so as to help the Air Nomads regain their former glory.

For the next four years, he did what he could to fill the shoes of a woman skilled in political manoeuvring and in the trickery she'd needed to help her people. He was never as good as her, and the communications sent to him made sure that he knew that.

When he was thirteen, he talked his uncle into allowing him into the war room. It was a first step in gaining more responsibility, more access to the resources to help his mother's people. It was there he heard they were going to sacrifice a whole company for the sake of a victory that had no strategic significance whatsoever. He ignored his uncle's warning and spoke out against it.

His father demanded satisfaction for the disrespect his son had shown. Zuko agreed to the agni kai. When he saw his father striding out onto the floor, Zuko was trapped. To attack the Fire Lord was treason and worthy of banishment or even execution. To refuse the Fire Lord, especially on a matter of honour was a matter of treason as well. So he begged for mercy, much good it did him.

He was lying on his uncle's ship, which had just set off in search of the avatar, the only way he could ever return home, when the last letter from his mother arrived. The Nomads had been forced to flee their Fire Nation homes. She was disappointed in him. How could he jeopardise her and her people out of a desire to protect fire bending scum like himself? The banishment, she declared, was his own fault.

Heartbroken, and not wanting to be faced with hearing his uncle declare him a failure too, (something Zuko was sure was inevitable, since the man, no matter how compassionate he appeared, was a firebender) he crept off the ship at the next port, taking his swords and some advanced firebending technique scrolls with him. Outside of the small port city, he found his bison friend, Shuga, and hopped aboard her, hoping to find somewhere to live out his exile in peace.

He never knew his uncle searched for him for two years, desperately trying to find the boy he thought of as a second son. Even if he had known, he would still have preferred staying away, certain that he could only ever be a disappointment to everyone.

Over the years of his exile, he travelled, meeting people, learning tricks of firebending from itinerant performers who never used it to fight, and practicing his swordplay skills against anyone he could. Eventually, he and Shuga came to the Southern Air Temple.

This is where our story truly starts.


	2. The Southern Air Temple

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: So here's the first chapter, taking the place of the original Southern Air Temple episode. I will warn you again, that I will not be redoing every single episode. In some cases I will just say, "So then that happened," and get on with the story I'm writing. Also, these may well be a variety of chapter lengths, some longer some shorter.

* * *

Happy bison bellows brought Zuko out of his meditation. He had hidden in one of the inner sanctums where the air was still enough that he could properly light candles for his meditation altar. Shuga normally didn't make a lot of noise, so when he heard her sounding off outside, he was concerned.

Racing through the temple, worried that perhaps Fire Nation troops had come to ensure no airbenders had taken up residence, he was shocked to see a second bison, a male bison, flirting with Shuga. Nearby were two teenagers, dressed in Water Tribe clothes, and an infuriating and terrifying sight met his eyes with the third figure.

It was a boy, dressed in the clothes of the old Air Nomads. With Nomad tattoos. Of all the self-centred, childish, self-important . . . his mental vocabulary failed. Zuko couldn't help himself as he stormed into sight. "What in the name of all that's holy do you think you're doing!" he roared at the boy. "Dressed up as a Nomad? Painting tattoos all over yourself! Do you want to bring the Fire Nation down on the Water enclaves? I know the ones hiding with the Water Tribes have been more isolated, but that is no excuse sheer idiocy!"

"What?" the boy asked, looking entirely confused. "What are you-"

Zuko didn't give him a chance to speak. "The people of air have remained hidden for this past century for a reason, and parading around and showing off your heritage is a death sentence!" He could feel himself trembling in fury. "I don't even know if my mother and sister are alive or dead because they had to leave before the Fire Nation discovered the enclave in Cheng-Dhu. So go home, change back into your normal clothes and don't drag your Tribe friends into our troubles, the Tribes have enough on their own as it is!"

His words had a completely opposite effect on the boy. "Katara! Sokka! Do you know what this means?"

The male teen, Sokka apparently, said, "We're on a mountain with a crazy guy who thinks there are airbenders at the South Pole and in the Fire Nation of all places?"

That one statement did more to deflate Zuko's anger than anything else could have. The sarcasm, the way the other teen was looking for the most dangerous but sensible explanation, it meant one of the three was dealing in common sense.

"It means," the youngest said, "That airbenders survived." He grinned happily at Zuko, who instinctively stepped away. The only reason anyone ever smiled at him was because they were planning to hurt him. Experience had taught him that was the truth with few exceptions. The smile dimmed a little, but barely. Eagerly he asked, "What do you mean by enclaves? Are there a lot? Are you an airbender? Why isn't anyone else here?"

"Aang," said the girl. "Just because the airbenders survived doesn't mean they're anything like they were before. He was angry because you were showing you're an airbender. It means it's probably really dangerous to do that."

"Who are you people?" Zuko asked. "What do you mean? You're talking like that kid's missed what happened over the last hundred years or something."

"Uh . . . I . . . uh, sort of did," the bald kid said, nervously rubbing the back of his head.

"Aang," Sokka said, "Stop talking about it. We don't know who this guy is." He turned to Zuko. "No offense."

Given his own secrets, Zuko was hardly in a position to be pointing fingers about honesty and openness. "None taken," he said. Still. "So . . ." he paused, and then said, "Aang, right?" When the kid nodded he continued. "You're not from an enclave?"

"I don't even know what you're talking about," the kid told him.

"How . . ." Zuko shook his head. Then he caught sight of Shuga, sidling up to the male bison. "Shuga!" he shouted at her, "If I have to leave you behind with another enclave herd because you're calving I'm not going to be happy with you!"

She grumbled and shuffled back a little. Then decided to ignore him and started grooming the male anyways.

Zuko felt a headache coming on. "So the other bison is your friend?" the boy asked eagerly.

Even though he knew it wasn't meant that way, years of taunts from the other children, _Lee, he's half bison, that explains why he's not smart enough to be friends with real people. Can't you talk to anyone who's not a big furry beast? Why would we want to talk to you? You're barely even a bender at all_, made his jaw clench. "Yes," he grated out.

The girl sighed. "Look. I know you don't know us and we don't know you, but maybe we can talk. I think Aang needs to know more about these enclaves you mentioned." She looked him up and down and then turned to Aang with a significant look on her face. "Aang? It's up to you what we tell him."

When the boy nodded, Sokka rolled his eyes, threw his hands up in the air and told them, "Fine! And when it all blows up in our faces, I get to say 'I told you so.'"

The other two turned their backs on him and the girl said. "I'm Katara, Sokka's my brother and Aang . . . he's the avatar."

For one brief, heady moment, Zuko contemplated knocking the kid on the head and kidnapping him while he had the chance. He could hand the avatar to his father, take back his birthright, return to the palace and . . .

And what?

He hated it there. Surrounded by firebenders, untrustworthy bastards,_ I know you are, but what am I?_, with a father who didn't like him and a sadist for a younger sister. There was no telling what his uncle thought of him by then and the enclave, the only place he'd ever felt even remotely close to at home, didn't exist any more.

"How do you know that?" he asked, instead. "Why should I believe you?"

"Sokka and I found him in an iceberg, by accident," Katara told him. "Just the day after he woke up, part of the ice shelf our village rests on cracked and broke off. Aang bended it back into place with water bending."

"His eyes and the tattoos were glowing," Sokka added, clearly figuring that once they were telling the story, it should be told right.

They didn't seem to be lying, and the story was too incredible to be something they'd made up to convince people. "Aang still hasn't learned waterbending, and since I'm the only waterbender left at the South Pole, I wanted to learn too. So we're going to the North Pole to find a teacher," Katara told him.

"What were you doing in an iceberg?" he asked Aang.

"If it's so dangerous for an airbender to be running around outside one of those enclaves, why are you here?" countered Aang. "And are you even an airbender? You don't look like an airbender, you look like a firebender." It was a fair point.

Zuko sighed. "The short version is that I don't know where any other enclaves are. The Air Nomads, when they scattered, they hid among the other three nations. They had children with Earth, Water and Fire nation people. There aren't a lot of . . . well . . . pure air nomads left."

He was about to continue, when Aang said, "I'm getting tired, let's sit down." With that, the boy folded up his legs and practically floated to the ground. There was no effort, there was no movement, it was just . . . done. Zuko felt his eyes bug out of his head. "What?"

"I guess . . . I never really realised what it meant that none of the air masters survived the initial purges to teach anyone," Zuko said. He slumped to the ground. "What you just did? Maybe anybody could have done that before, but now? My mother's one of the best-trained airbenders there is, and she could never just . . ." Zuko waved a hand in the air to demonstrate Aang's ease with his airbending.

"But how do you train if you don't have anyone to teach you?" Katara asked. She sounded very eager, and suddenly Zuko recalled she'd just said she didn't have a teacher at all.

"We adapted different bending styles," Zuko said with a shrug. "Fire Nation airbenders adapted the firebending styles to airbending. There are some things that are different, and some things I think are actual airbending moves, but mostly it's the same style." He sighed. "I'd heard they figured out how to change it to earthbending in the Earth Kingdom and waterbending in the Tribes, but I don't know how that turned out."

"Huh," Aang said. "Can you show me?" he asked. "I mean, some of the stuff that was adapted."

"I . . ." Zuko paused. "I don't think I'm the right person to do that," he said. "I'm really the weakest bender out of all the others from the enclave. Also . . ." he decided to admit something up front. The fewer lies he told now, the fewer to be caught out in later. "I wasn't there a lot. My mother's marriage was arranged so that she'd be high up in the Fire Nation and could use the position to protect the enclave from discovery. After she was banished, I . . . didn't do so well at doing what she did and I had to leave, too."

"But your father-" Katara started to say. Zuko didn't let her finish.

"My father is a firebender faithful to the ideals of Fire Lord Sozin," he said bitterly. "He never knew I wasn't just . . ." he trailed off, not even sure what he was going to say.

"Normal?" Sokka asked. "Boy have I been there. You're not a bender so you're not the special one," he said with remarkably little bitterness. "It doesn't help with a younger sister who's special."

"No," Zuko agreed, "It really doesn't."

"You have a sister?" Katara asked.

"Two," Zuko said. "One older, one younger. My older sister's an airbender so I've only seen her a few times. It wasn't safe for her living with the rest of the family." He felt the disappointment all over again as if it were new. "You'd think she'd put the sun in the sky the way my mother talks about her. My younger sister's a firebending prodigy."

"Man," Sokka said, "You win. You're completely worse off than I am in the sibling stakes."

Katara shot her brother a look. "And I'll bet he doesn't have to wash his sisters' socks."

Aang nodded sagaciously. "You make a good point, Katara."

"What's that supposed to mean?" demanded the Water Tribe boy of his companions.

"Have you ever smelled your socks?" they demanded in unison.

Zuko smiled in spite of himself. But he had questions of his own he still wanted answered. "What brings you here anyhow? I was just stopping somewhere for a while that I knew would be relatively safe for a few days."

"It's my home," Aang answered. "Or it was, anyway. This is where I was raised, and I guess I kinda still expected it would be the same." He looked around, sadly. "It's not, though." Then he floated to his feet with that same effortless use of his element that had Zuko shaking his head. "There's something I have to do, though," the boy said and started off toward the interior. While he and the other two went off together, Zuko stayed behind, watching his bison flirt with Aang's. "Aren't you coming?" Aang asked.

"No," Zuko said. "I'll stay here with the bisons." The other three tripped off toward the inner sanctums of the temple, while Zuko settled onto the steps to think. Something in him, after three years of so much solitude, wanted a human friend. A person he could actually talk to and who would talk back. Shuga was wonderful, but affirmative and negative grunts only took you so far. Not to mention that they didn't need to know the truth. Aang was the Avatar, so he'd be used to everyone not being as good as he was, he wouldn't judge Zuko about his bending, and Katara was an untrained waterbender. She wouldn't know the difference, and neither would her brother.

He'd always wanted to have friends his own age and gender, like Azula had.

They never needed to know he was a firebender, let alone the banished crown prince. He could just . . . be like everyone else. It was a seductive idea.

Zuko didn't know how long he sat, watching Shuga nuzzle the other bison and the other bison nuzzle back, but suddenly he heard Sokka and Aang shouting, Aang laughing and Sokka frustrated. The younger boy hurtled through the courtyard and Zuko bolted to his feet. Aang had just run into the enclosure that Zuko had slowly, but surely been clearing of dead bodies and armour. He'd discovered it on his first day there and had set up a funeral pyre on the far side of the temple. It seemed indecent to leave the remains just lying there, so he'd started to clear them, but it was slow going.

There was the body of an Air Nomad monk in there, and spirits knew if Aang had known him, but the boy might have. His worst fears were confirmed as he and Sokka arrived behind the boy in time to hear the broken whisper, "Gyatso . . ."

Sokka reached out to pull the kid away, saying, "Oh, man . . . come on, Aang, everything will be all right. Let's get out of here."

All hell broke loose. Zuko stepped back, eyes wide as the avatar's own eyes lit up to a blank blue-white light, spilling out of the sockets, all his tattoos glowing the same colour. Around him, a ball of air spun into being, whipping around him, lifting him up off the ground, spinning with the raw force of a hurricane. "Aang! Snap out of it!" Sokka shouted in desperation.

A ball of pure energy erupted from the boy's form, blasting Sokka and Zuko away, and taking part of the building with it. Exchanging desperate glances, Zuko and Sokka clung to the mountain's face. Katara came running out a moment later, asking what had happened. When they told her, the most amazing thing Zuko had ever seen happened.

Braving the wind and the fury coming off that small body, Katara crept close to Aang, telling him she and Sokka were his family, that they'd stay with him, and that she knew what he was going through from the loss of her own mother. With her words, Aang suddenly calmed, and turned back into the boy he was, collapsing against the Water siblings.

Zuko felt cold. How could he have ever thought he'd be a worthy companion for these three? The Avatar and these two teenagers who would so willingly put themselves on the line for Aang and each other. He was just a firebender, could he even be up to it? It was that thought that decided him. His mother's stiff-necked determination to believe he could never be a good person, that no firebender was worth anything, that made him decide to prove her wrong.

"Could Shuga and I come with you?"

And just like that, everything changed.


	3. Kyoshi Island

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: The timing on the various episodes is going to shift. If you'll recall, in Kyoshi Island, Zuko expresses confusion about the Avatar's flight path, and the 'gAang' make it fairly clear they have no idea where they're going. Zuko has maps and will keep Aang on a better course, which allows them to manage canon adventures as well as my add-ons. This is going to be another short chapter, but after this, I'm hoping to get these longer. Part of the shortness, naturally, is that without Zuko's part in the story from the actual episode, there's very little conflict, not to mention all the things that Iroh and Zuko would have otherwise done obviously can't happen.

On another note, let me reassure anyone who's wondering, yes, I will eventually bring Iroh into the fic. Just keep in mind, he has no reason to be anywhere near where Aang and the others are, so he has no reason to show up. But he will. I promise. Also, yes, I'm just doing this because I want to follow the Avatar story arc as closely as possible, which means I need for Sokka to have met Suki and all that other stuff.

* * *

Zuko sighed as they landed on Kyoshi. It felt ridiculous, but they _did_ need to do a proper supply run before they started toward the North Pole. Katara and Sokka had gone ahead to get proper permission from the Kyoshi Warriors to land and bargain for supplies. After all, no matter what he was claiming, Zuko knew he looked like a firebender, and that would get them in trouble if things weren't explained in advance.

They were all to meet at the bay, where Aang was going to indulge in his desire to ride strange animals. Zuko sighed, leaning against Shuga, watching as the bald boy cavorted with the giant fish.

Suddenly, Katara popped up at his elbow, grinning like a maniac. "Hey Lee! Sorry I scared you," she said, looking entirely unrepentant.

He knew she'd done it deliberately, but he gave her the satisfaction anyhow, because he didn't know any other way to try to reclaim the dignity she tramped all over so regularly. "You didn't _scare_ me, you _startled_ me. There _is_ a difference," he snapped, with all the airs and self-assurance of the prince he'd once been.

She made a noise that sounded and awful lot like, "Shpff," which was far too dismissive for his taste – who went around startling people for no reason? – then asked, "What's Aang doing out there?"

"Riding on the elephant koi," Zuko said. "I know he's just twelve, but really? Giant fish? He's the Avatar. He could stand a _little_ more dignity." Just then, Aang seemed to notice Katara, because the fish started to weave around like crazy, clearly inspired by the crazy bender hanging onto its dorsal fin.

Katara smiled, and waved back, a little absently, and said, "Oh, let him have fun. He's just a kid. He'll be stuck being," and here she waved her hands around, putting on a patently fake deep portentous voice, "The Avatar," she reverted to normal, "Soon enough."

"Point taken," Zuko said. He'd seen children in the villages, years and years older than he was when he first had the weight of his responsibilities pressed onto his shoulders, and those children had been so carefree, and . . . well . . . childish. It made him envious. But Aang's burdens were greater than the ones Zuko had once had, and how could he begrudge the kid a little extra time as a child? Especially since apparently he wasn't supposed to have known about being the Avatar until he was sixteen anyhow.

He was snapped out of his reverie by Katara saying, "Shuga! Don't eat that!" and heading into the brush after his wayward bison.

"What's she eating?" he called, worried about Shuga.

"She was going after the pika berries," Katara called back. "Don't worry!" then her voice changed, clearly addressing Shuga now. "Have some nice fir ivy. Hmm? There's a good girl." Shuga made the sound that indicated she was getting scratched in one of her favourite spots.

"Don't spoil her!" he shouted back. Then he glanced back at the bay. Suddenly, he saw all the elephant koi but the one Aang was riding hurry off, and an enormous shadow start coming up behind Aang in the water. "Aang! Get back here!" he shouted, but the boy didn't seem to hear. The koi bucked him off, leaving the young bender in the water.

"What's-" Katara started to ask, but when she followed Zuko's gaze, she saw it too. "Aang! Get out of the water!"

Aang seemed to think they were cheering him as he cavorted. "Is there anything you can do?" Zuko asked as the shadow drew closer. "You're a water bender."

"No," Katara moaned. "He's too far away, and I don't have the strength to move that much water."

Suddenly, a huge fin burst out of the water, incredibly close to where Aang was treading water. They both saw the airbender freeze, and then, in a burst of panic-fuelled bending, run over the surface of the water, just barely outpacing the giant fin and whatever the fin was attached to. Then he kept going and slammed the other two into a tree in the process of stopping.

Zuko lay still for a moment, then suddenly realised that he was sprawled all over Katara. He started to try to get off of her, and instantly got tangled with her efforts to wriggle out from under him, sending them both tumbling back down again, their noses an inch apart. On his second try, Zuko just rolled off. Better safe than, "Sorry." Except for his head where Aang had managed to send him facefirst into the tree, and his back from where the kid had hit, and the stick that had given him splinters in his palm, lying on top of Katara had been . . . nice. He felt himself blushing, and cursed the fact that he was so pale, everything showed on his face.

"It's okay," she told him, blushing as well.

They got to their feet, and he noticed Katara subtly rubbing her back and neck. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah," she said, "I just hit the tree pretty hard. What _was_ that thing?"

"I don't know," said Aang.

Zuko looked around, and finally noticed the last of their human companions still wasn't back. "Where's Sokka?"

Katara snickered. "Oh, him. He's determined to show everyone on Kyoshi how a "real man" fights."

"He didn't?" Zuko asked, in some dismay. "I told him they were some of the greatest warriors in the world."

The waterbender shrugged. "And he decided that since girls are only good at sewing and cooking, while guys can only be good at hunting and fighting. He's trying to prove his point. I figured I'd let him do that while I went to get you two." She led the way to Shuga, hopping up and settling onto the bison's saddle. "I told them about you, Lee. Actually, I kind of um . . ."

Aang looked at her, concerned. "What did you tell them?"

"Well," Katara looked apologetically at Zuko. "I may have embellished a little."

"About what?" Zuko asked.

"I kind of made a big deal about you hiding your true self from your father, and your mother being missing and you being never able to go home and everything." She caught the look of irritation on his face immediately. "Look. You look like Fire Nation. I just . . . wanted all the rumours to be that you were a really good guy before you even got there. I wanted them to give you a chance."

That, right there, was why Zuko had so quickly become devoted to his new friends. It was why he'd never tell them the real truth about himself. They wanted him. They wanted other people to like him. He'd never had that. His mother could have given him that chance, but she'd preferred to let others draw their own conclusions, and she'd never taken his side or defended him.

Here was a girl who'd barely known him for any time at all, and she was trying her hardest to let him be accepted when everything about him should repel others. But his pride said something else. It said people should respect him on his own merits or not at all, and it also said, "I don't want anyone's pity."

Katara glared at him. "Fine. Sorry I tried to make everything _easier_ for you."

Zuko hopped onto Shuga's head and sent her toward the village. When they got there, he and Katara negotiated for a while for supplies while Aang was rapidly swamped by a somewhat hysterical crowd of people, one of whom was foaming at the mouth in his excitement. Eventually they finished, and the two separated to explore the village.

While walking through the town, he passed a room full of warrior women learning the use of their fans. Suddenly he stopped dead. In the midst of the crowd of girls, was Sokka. In a dress. With Kyoshi makeup on. "That makes everything worth it," he muttered to himself with a grin.

"What makes what worth it?" asked a voice from behind him.

Zuko whipped around, and saw one of the Kyoshi warrior women was standing behind him. "What? Oh, in there," he gestured to the practice room. "Seeing Sokka make a fool of himself in a dress makes dealing with him being an idiot worth it."

The young woman glanced over, and then laughed. "Oh, him. He started trying to convince Suki that he was some great warrior and that women shouldn't carry weapons."

"I told him," Zuko said with a sigh. "I told him Kyoshi's warriors were some of the best in the world."

"So," she said, "You're Lee, Katara's friend." She bowed slightly. "My name is Kami."

"Kami, it's an honour to meet you," Zuko told her. "Actually, if it wouldn't seem to forward, I had been hoping, while I was here, to have a chance to spar with one of the warriors."

"Oh?" she raised an eyebrow. "Why is that?"

Zuko smiled. "For one thing, I haven't had a decent sparring partner in a very long time, and teaching Sokka doesn't count. He has potential, but he doesn't have the training."

"And you do?" She asked with a smile.

"I'm better than him, and I'd like to see how I do against one of the best," Zuko said, adding in some flattery in the hopes of convincing her. He'd missed good sparring with an opponent he could trust to be honourable and not steal his purse if he lost.

She grinned. "I like that. I know of a good place we could spar."

"Lead the way."

It was hard, and the challenge left him grinning. Fighting against Kyoshi fans meant his opponent was always getting in too close for him to use his swords, and when he got far enough away to use them, she was fast enough to block anything he threw at her. Over the couple of days they stayed on Kyoshi, stocking up, he spent a lot of time learning some new fighting techniques and just resting up before the bulk of the journey north, and the two became quite close.

When it was time to leave, Kami was there on the beach where Shuga and Appa stood, loaded and ready to fly. "So, I guess this is it," Kami said, regretfully. "Are you sure I can't talk you into staying? Those dao blades of yours are fun."

Zuko shook his head. The last couple days had seen a shift in his relationship with Sokka, and the two had spent one night being teenaged boys, comparing pretty girls and making stupid adolescent jokes. He'd had a chance to talk to Aang about expectations, and had found a kindred spirit when it came to people expecting things they shouldn't have had any right to expect. There was also Katara, who was fun and sarcastic and who he'd hate to leave with all the work of looking after the other two. "I can't. I promised I'd go with them."

"Well, if you're ever on Kyoshi again," Kami said, "Look me up." Then she gently pressed her lips to his. Zuko's eyes fluttered closed. He'd been kissed before, gone further, in fact, but he didn't think it had ever been because the girl liked _him_. Or Lee. Whatever. It had always been something to do with him being Prince Zuko, or the only boy around who wasn't a mouth-breathing idiot with no teeth. Having a girl kiss him because she liked him? It was _very_ nice.

He smiled back. "I will." Then he climbed onto Shuga, was joined by Sokka, and the four waved their goodbyes as they took to the sky, continuing Northward.


	4. Imprisoned

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: Yes, I skipped Omashu pretty much entirely. That's because, when I thought about it, nothing really happened that would be worth taking the time over. So two paragraphs really does cover everything that happened that was different. At least in my head.

I'd have more notes, but the notes appear at the end of the fic because they are spoilery for the story, so you'll get to them then.

* * *

The stop at Omashu was alternately boring, exasperating and terrifying for Zuko. Knowing that all he had to do to free himself was to use his firebending to blast the minerals off his hands, it had been deeply frustrating that he had to hide his true bending nature. At the same time, he didn't dare. He didn't dare risk losing the friends he'd made and he didn't dare risk offending the crazy old king with his crazy tests for Aang.

Luckily for Zuko, Aang had figured everything out just before Sokka was totally enveloped, and Zuko didn't have to firebend to save himself and the others. But it was very close, and he'd started gathering his strength to get free in those final moments.

Now they were stopped to give the bisons a rest and to pick up some food for dinner. Zuko had separated from Sokka, having quickly learned that the other boy, while reasonably skilled at hunting in the poles, (at least, Zuko could see the _theory_ of what the other was doing as far as hunting on tundra was concerned) he didn't really seem to have much of a grasp of hunting in the woods. Nor did he seem to know much about what was edible or not.

Not that Zuko knew that much either, but he knew more than Sokka. But the other boy had his pride and wasn't going to listen. Knowing something about being allowed what little pride you could have, Zuko had decided to leave him to it and went off to collect his own supplies for the group.

Having also learned Aang was a vegetarian, Zuko had done his best to butcher and cut up the rabbit squirrel he'd caught somewhere out of sight of the camp. He arrived with his offerings at the same time Sokka did.

"Great! You're back! What's for dinner?" Aang asked.

Zuko produced the tubers and couple of slightly squashy squash, saying, "That's all I found that I knew was safe." Then he turned to Katara. "I got a rabbit squirrel too," he told her and handed over the two bags.

"Well, we've got a few options," Sokka declared, rummaging through his own bag. "First, round nuts and some kind of oval shaped nuts, and some rock shaped nuts that might just be rocks. Dig in!" he declared with unnatural cheer. Then he tossed a rock over his shoulder.

"You're not serious?" Zuko asked. "You've got six rocks in that miniscule pile of nuts. We'd do better letting Shuga and Momo look."

"Not Appa?" Katara asked, her lips quirking a little.

Zuko smiled back at her in spite of his irritation. "Appa eats everything that isn't either an animal or rocks that he can get his teeth on."

"Good point," Katara said.

They were about to continue heckling Sokka when a noise a little like exploding blasting jelly startled them all. "What was that!" demanded Sokka. They all looked at each other, bewildered, then it came again.

"It's coming from over there!" shouted Aang, pointing. He and Katara bounded off in the direction of the booms.

Zuko found himself in perfect agreement with Sokka, when the other boy said, "Shouldn't we run _away_ from the huge booms, not toward them?"

"We should," he said, even as they sprinted after the two idiots who made up the other half of their party. "But that would mean leaving your sister and Aang to deal with whatever's making the noise."

"She always does this," moaned Sokka. "It's how we found Aang. She made the glacier explode and just decided to rescue the weird guy with the tattoos who showed up in a big glowy ball of ice."

"Seriously?" Zuko asked.

"If my sister weren't crazy, the avatar would still be locked up in a glacier," Sokka affirmed.

They caught up to the other two about then, and finally saw what was causing the noise. It was a long-haired earthbender. Moving his arms, changing his stances smoothly, he turned about, smashing boulders into each other and generally making a very noisy display of himself. "An earthbender!" said Katara, looking a little too pleased with this development.

Zuko had never liked earthbenders. They were stubborn, unmoving, and frequently so phlegmatic as to be extremely annoying. However, he supposed the novelty was what was making Katara so pleased. "Let's go meet him!" exclaimed Aang.

"He looks dangerous-"

"He could be dangerous-"

Sokka and Zuko started overtop each other. They both paused, but it was enough time that when it was agreed that Sokka would get to finish the sentence, "We should approach cautiously," it was too late. Katara was already bounding toward the guy.

"Your sister really _is_ crazy," Zuko said.

"Hello there! My name's Katara! What's your name?" she greeted happily.

Then the earthbending boy with the long hair and headband ran away.

Zuko and Sokka exchanged glances. "That was really weird," Sokka said.

"Nice to meet you!" Aang called after the earthbender.

Katara pouted. "We just wanted to say hi."

Still stuck on another topic, Zuko asked, "Did something happen that made her like this?"

"No," Sokka said. "She's just always been that way."

"Huh," said Zuko contemplatively.

Meanwhile, Aang and Katara had reached the conclusion that there had to be a village nearby, which meant they didn't have to have anything to do with Sokka's nuts. Zuko could rather see the attraction. Still, he was a little miffed they had forgotten about his contributions. When he caught up, having gone back to collect his vegetables and squirrel rabbit from where he'd left them at their camp, he heard Katara scolding Sokka. "Sokka! Just because you want more meat doesn't mean we're getting it. Lee already caught a squirrel rabbit, and I'm not going to waste good money on something that's only going to waste."

His irritation was forgotten, and he smiled.

Then she seemed to spot something and went racing off. Zuko looked, and saw the earthbender from before. Aang was off like a shot after her, and Sokka and Zuko followed quickly after. They arrived in time to hear the earthbender denying that he'd been bending, claiming that the travellers' clothes were enough to prove they were crazy.

"You know how dangerous that is! You know what would happen if _they_ caught you earthbending!" snapped his mother.

With a sinking feeling, Zuko thought he knew the answer to who the mysterious 'they' were. He was proven right when, a moment later, a Fire Nation soldier entered the store and began threatening the woman, demanding taxes, claiming they'd doubled. It was extortion and it was everything that made Zuko ashamed of his true nature.

And it reaffirmed to him that he would train his bending until he could counterfeit airbending well enough to fool anyone. He had to. He would never let himself become like that thug.

"Nice guy," Sokka said dryly. "How long has the Fire Nation been here?"

Haru's mother looked worn down as she said, "Five years. Fire Lord Ozai uses our town's coal to fuel his ships."

Zuko felt sick as he thought of what his family's policies were doing. Just because the earthbenders were practically savages, their bending a matter of big effects and a rockheaded insistence of facing off with things best left alone, that did not mean they deserved to be taken away from their families.

It was much later that evening, as they sat in Haru's mother's barn, watching Appa and Shuga munch through all the hay and make bison googly eyes at each other, that Zuko heard Katara's story about Haru saving the old man from the cave-in. While the others congratulated her, Zuko frowned. "Are you sure that was a good idea? If the Fire Nation is taking any earthbenders they find here, it really is a huge risk for him."

"So he should just let some poor man die when he could do something about it?" Katara demanded. "I can't believe you Lee!"

"I guess not," he said, and pulled away from the conversation. Maybe his mother had been right about firebenders lacking compassion.

Then next morning, Katara came in crying that the Fire Nation had taken Haru away. Zuko was sorry, felt a little vindicated that he'd been right about the risk, and doubly upset that the situation had upset Katara and the others.

And then she told them her plan.

"Katara, this is insane," he snapped as he trailed around after her. Aang and Sokka were both on board, but Zuko wasn't. He was, actually, very irritated with her for planning to get herself thrown into prison for someone she'd only met days before.

She shook her head stubbornly. "Lee, if I hadn't been there, if we hadn't been _here_, Haru would still be at home with his mother." Katara fixed a look on him. "I'm not backing out. Are you helping or not?"

"You know I am," he snapped. "I just want to go on the record as having said this is a terrible idea."

"You and Sokka both," she told him.

Zuko glared at her. "Your brother seems to have more common sense than you do."

"Sokka?" Katara gasped. "The same guy who makes muscles at himself in every reflection he sees? Who keeps eating all the food even though he knows we need to keep a budget and share with each other? The guy who keeps trying to eat Momo when Aang's not looking?" Her eyes were wide in disbelief. "_That_ Sokka?"

He threw his arms in the air in exasperation. "Fine! Get yourself killed in some Fire Nation prison camp! See if I care." He stomped over to where Aang was hiding before the soldiers arrived. They plan was going off mostly without a hitch, when one of the soldiers caught sight of Momo behind the rock.

The rock Katara had pointed at and shouted how she was going to move it 'earthbending style'.

"That lemur! It's earthbending!" shouted one of the soldiers.

A deep sense of embarrassment on behalf of his countrymen overtook Zuko for a moment. _Really? The lemur? How exactly had the Fire Nation managed to take over as much of the world as they had?_

Sokka was forced to point out to the soldiers that his sister had been the one supposedly bending, and Zuko had to watch Katara get carted off. Everything in him said to go after her then, knock out the soldiers and take her back. But she'd started this, and they couldn't afford extra attention. Then one of them deliberately tripped her, using the 'accident' as an excuse to feel her up.

His temper had always been one of his shortcomings.

Zuko burst out from behind the rocks, shouting, "Leave her alone!" Before he could even think about what he was doing, he sharpened his focus, sending a blast of superheated air into the cliff behind him, loosening a pile of rubble, then, having to concentrate, feeling like he was forcing his flame into a solid somehow, spun the hot air around into a stream and sent a pile of various rocks, dirt and sand at the firebenders. He was vaguely aware of Sokka's jaw dropping. It _was_ the first time he'd bent around them.

But it succeeded at making him look like an earthbender. He wasn't as lucky as Katara, as such a complicated and difficult piece of firebending left him exhausted long enough for the soldiers grab him, and then with a sharp pain, everything went dark. He thought he heard Katara calling, "Lee!" as he fell.

When he woke up, it was hours later, and he was captive, along with Katara and a bunch of earthbenders. "Are you alright?" Katara asked, as he slowly sat up, rubbing at the bump on his head. "Maybe you should stay down for a while. They hit you really hard."

"I've had worse," Zuko said dismissively. When he tried to stand, only his pride kept from admitting that she might have been right as the world swam around him rather dangerously. He sat back down rather sharply, waiting for the dizziness to subside. She raised an eyebrow at him, clearly holding back on her sarcasm only because it was possible he actually had.

He _had_ in fact had worse, but this was still pretty awful and high up the scale of bad.

Katara was looking fairly anxious though, so he asked, "What's going on? Why is it so late? Did something happen to Sokka and Aang?"

"Well . . ."

She didn't look exactly worried in the way that meant something horrible had happened. She looked the same way she had earlier that day (yesterday?) when she'd proposed getting herself arrested to find Haru and break him out of prison. She was thinking something crazy. "What did you do?"

"Sokka's got a plan to get coal out of the furnaces and to the earthbenders so they can use it to fight back."

Zuko just stared at her. His mind was whirling. But mostly, he was just gibbering in his head that she was crazy and they were going to be captured and dragged off to the Boiling Rock and then Azula and his father would come and they'd expose him and the prisoners would beat him to death if his family didn't kill him first. "What?" he asked. She explained the plan, the fact that they were going to blast the coal out of a particular vent onto the deck and Katara was going to try to rabble-rouse the earthbenders.

Sokka's plan was sound, but for it's depending on the earthbenders to fight back. Zuko whimpered internally. "Where's Shuga?" he asked. "I mean, I know they brought Appa, but what did you do with my bison?" It was the only thing he could concentrate on that wasn't going to leave him in a blind panic.

"We told her to stay at the farm. It wasn't like they could fly two bisons here, and two are twice as likely to be spotted as one," Katara said. Then she looked up, and following her glance, Zuko saw Sokka near one of the vents.

"There's the intruder!" shouted a Fire Nation guard. They'd managed to sneak up on Sokka.

It wasn't even a conscious choice as Zuko and Katara practically flew across the deck to the boy's side. Katara shoved Zuko's swords at him as they ran, something he was intensely grateful for. "Stay back!" Sokka shouted as he pulled out that boomerang he was so fond of.

"Katara stop! You can't win this fight!" shouted an older man from the crowd. The way Haru was standing next to him, Zuko thought he might be the guy's father. Haru looked stunned, as did Katara. Zuko wondered why he always had to be vindicated about bad things happening.

The warden smirked, and said, "Listen to him well, child. You're one mistake away from dying where you stand."

With a burst of coal dust, coal and a blast of air powering it all, Aang popped out of the vent, covered in coal dust himself, looking a tad sheepish. Katara mounted the pile and shouted, "Here's your chance, earthbenders! Take it! Your fate is in your own hands!"

And Zuko was right again, as Haru's father held him back and the rest shrank back from Katara, muttering. It was just like a bunch of earthbenders, he thought in disgust. Once they got an idea into their heads, there was no getting it out, and if they chose to cower, no force on earth was going to make them change their minds.

Still, _he_ was a firebender. And a firebender never gives up. They fight. He was beside her, furious with them for living down to his expectations. "What is wrong with you?" he shouted over whatever the warden was saying. "You have the chance to fight back! There are more of you than there are of them! Do something!"

He flung himself into the simple, easy, attacks he'd trained himself in as a child. The ones he could use to fake airbending with ease. It was only a moment to break through their lines and grab a pike, using it for some of the few air moves that had survived a century's worth of Fire Nation purges. He was expecting them to close in on him, but suddenly, he heard the sounds of battle elsewhere, and in a brief breather, he saw what looked like the largest chunk of coal he'd ever seen punch a hole through the wall.

The earthbenders had joined in the fighting, while Sokka was using his boomerang and sheer untaught talent to disarm the Fire Nation soldiers. Zuko, who'd had no real chance to bend for days, happily lost himself in bending. Even the fact that he couldn't properly firebend, but had to fake airbending was just an exciting challenge for his skills.

Then suddenly it was over and Shuga was arriving, looking very put out at having missed the excitement. She even seemed to be snubbing Appa, which cheered Zuko a little more than maybe it should have. Ever practical, Zuko took a quick look around, seeing if there were any useful supplies they could bring with them, when he stumbled across a small blue pendant on a blue ribbon.

They'd said their farewells to the earthbenders, and set off. Katara had chosen to join Zuko on Shuga for that part of the trip, and they had set Shuga to following Appa before Katara dragged Zuko down into the bottom of the saddle and started fussing over the bump on his head. When it got annoying, Zuko said, "Aren't you missing something?" and pointed at her throat.

"What?" she asked, then gasped as the necklace wasn't there. "Oh no! Mom's necklace!"

He smiled. "Luckily, I have keen eyes," he told her, and dangled it in front of her.

She reached for it, but he yanked it away before she could grab it. "Hey!"

"I'll give it back on one condition."

"What's that?"

He smirked. "I was going to suggest that you never do anything this crazy again, but I think you're just incapable of it."

Katara glared at him. "Lee . . ."

"Stop poking me woman," he said. "Promise to leave me alone for a few hours so I can get some sleep and I'll give it back."

The glare intensified. "Fine. See if I try to help you next time you get hurt," she groused, and held out her hand.

He put the necklace in her palm, and gently folded her fingers over it for her. "Be more careful with that," he said. "I may not always be able to find it for you." He sighed, and settled back on Shuga's saddle. "And why don't you make sure Aang's actually following the map I gave to him and Sokka. I really don't want to travel to every single place in the whole of the Earth Kingdom on my way to the North Pole."

Katara snorted, then said, "By the way. Thank you. You didn't have to try to defend me like that, but thank you. For all of it." She leaned forward quickly, pressed a feather-light kiss into his cheek so fast he almost wasn't sure it happened before going up to sit on Shuga's head and tell Aang to stop fooling around with his marbles, whatever that meant.

* * *

Post-fic notes: So here's the thing. Yes, I just knocked Zuko out for half of the mess on the prison ship. I will admit to wanting to avoid having to work him into the episode, but that's not actually why I did it. It's just a great bonus. I did it because Zuko's always been rash, and I want him to stay rash. And being just crazy enough to get himself in trouble (keep in mind, he _is_ handicapping himself bending-wise) is kind of like him.


	5. The Spirit World: Winter Solstice Part 1

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: And now, drumroll please, the first instalment of "scenes that just totally never happened on the show, period." Well, sort of, anyhow. The thing about the mess in "The Spirit World: Winter Solstice Part 1", is that it's really all about Aang's first step on his spiritual journey. However, this story is about Zuko, and I didn't want to spend the whole thing listening to him and Katara angst about whether or not Sokka and Aang were dead. Yes, I could use the opportunity to set up some 'shippyness, but I'll be frank, it's really too early in Katara and Zuko's relationship (such as it really _isn't_ right now) for them to vanish into the back of the temple and make with the gratuitous smoochies. Oh, yes, 'Hae', is Korean for 'sun' and 'Tahl' is Korean for moon. Or so the internet informs me. This is just something you may find interesting.

On another note, Zuko may seem awfully laid back in some ways, compared to canon Zuko, but he's spent three years as 'Lee', and he's a) trying to fit in with his new friends and b) deriving so much happiness from having a guy friend to goof off with and talk about guy things with that he's letting a lot slide he might not otherwise because it's just such a great experience for him. Finally, don't forget that when he joined the Avatar in canon, they were under a lot of pressure and the deadline was looming. At this point, they're still just a bunch of kids joyriding to the arctic, he doesn't have to make dramatic points about the Avatar being ready to face the Fire Lord. Also, yes, this is the first really big chapter.

* * *

Sokka was riding Shuga with Zuko, and the two were enjoying a comfortable silence. They'd happily degenerated into talks about cute girls they'd seen and whether Kami was prettier than Suki, and had discussed to death the topic of why it was younger sisters were crazy. They had come to the conclusion it was an attempt made by higher powers to balance that older brothers were _so_ awesome, that they needed to have some suffering to keep them humble.

It was everything Zuko had ever imagined having a male friend his own age could possibly be. It was better, in some ways, than Lu Ten had even been, because Lu Ten had been a lot older than he was, so they'd never been quite interested in the same things. He'd been too young to think about girls anyhow, when his cousin had died.

His friend was fun, and sometimes funny, and they shared a lot of interests. Of course, Sokka was also oddly obsessed with meat, and had a take on things that was sometimes a tad _too_ hysterical – all waving arms and wide, panicked eyes – but he had a _friend_.

The comfortable silence was broken by the sight of Aang waving at them, and then diving backwards off of Appa into the clouds. From the look on Katara's face, the boy was doing some freaky stunt again. Sokka sighed. "I wish he'd stop trying to impress her," he said with a groan. "I mean, it's not just that he's twelve and there isn't a single fourteen-year-old girl anywhere who'd be interested in him."

"It's that it's kind of obvious she doesn't even notice?" Zuko asked.

"Yeah," Sokka told him. "I mean, it's kind of exhausting watching him try and then all she does is pat him on the head."

Zuko eyed him sideways. "If she started to notice, and reciprocate, you'd be different, wouldn't you?"

Sokka sat up as a drenched Aang landed back on his bison. "Sure. I'd threaten the little creep to stay away from my sister. Wouldn't you?"

"Would I do that with Katara?" Zuko shrugged. "Doubt it. You'd try that on the _Avatar_?"

"First, Aang's just as easily intimidated as any other pipsqueak," Sokka said (over)confidently. "Second, I meant your sister."

Zuko stared at him. "No. I'd pity the poor fool who thought that Azula would ever want something as normal as a boyfriend." He paused, then said, "Maybe I'd laugh at him while she fried his eyeballs."

Sokka's eyes were very wide. "Fried his eyeballs? That's just a metaphor, right?"

"Yes," Zuko said. "But only because screaming blind people are loud and distracting."

"Your sister is frightening," Sokka told him.

Zuko was about to say something to the effect that he'd already explained that to Sokka, when Appa was clearly ordered into a dive. They directed Shuga down after him. By the time they'd landed, it was clear what had attracted the others' attention. The ground, and entire forest, had been charred to nothing. The way the fire had been spread, the damage that had been caused, they both made it clear it had been firebenders.

"It's like a scar," Sokka said, in shock. Inadvertently, Zuko reached up to feel the scar tissue that covered so much of his face.

"Damn Fire Nation," Zuko muttered, hating his homeland and himself just a little more. Why did he have to be born as one of a people that could do this? Was it some sickness inside firebenders that would someday consume him? He leaned back against Shuga, pressing his nose into her fur to block out the smell of ash and burnt things that pervaded the whole place. He saw Aang fall to his knees, a look of something like despair on his face.

Sokka didn't seem to have the same sense of grief Zuko and Aang did, he was angry. He had been looking at the footprints of the soldiers left behind on the scorched earth. "Fire Nation! Those evil savages make me sick! They have no respect for . . ."

Katara hushed him, pointing at Aang's slumped figure. "Why would anyone do this?" asked the young airbender. "How could I let this happen?"

"Aang, you didn't let this happen. It has nothing to do with you," Katara told him.

"She's right," Zuko put in. "It's the Fire Nation at fault. If they weren't the scum they are, none of this would be happening."

Sokka shot him a funny look. "I thought your dad was Fire Nation."

"He is," Zuko snapped. "I try to forget that I'm part scum." Something in Sokka's expression made Zuko look away, embarrassed by how bluntly he'd put it.

Aang ignored them both. "It _is_ my fault. It's the Avatar's job to protect nature. But I don't know how to do my job."

"That's why we're going to the North Pole," Katara said, gently. "To find you a teacher."

Aang shot her a look. "Yeah, a waterbending teacher, but there's no one who can teach me how to be the Avatar." There was nothing they could say to that, it was true. "Monk Gyatso said that Avatar Roku would help me."

"The Avatar before you?" Sokka asked, baffled. "He died over a hundred years ago, how are you supposed to talk to him?"

It was a good question. "I don't know," answered Aang.

Katara had looked away, a little saddened by Aang's grief and confusion. She frowned, bent over, picking something up off the ground. After examining it for a moment, she suddenly smiled, and said, "Hey Aang, are you ready to be cheered up?"

Zuko stared at her for a moment, along with Sokka. What was wrong with her? "No," Aang told her glumly. Then she threw the thing in her hand at the boy's head.

"Was your sister dropped on her head as a baby?" Zuko muttered to Sokka.

"Not that I know of," Sokka murmured back. "Then again, I'm only two years older than her, I may have missed something as a kid."

"Ow!" yelled Aang. "Hey, how was that cheering me up?" he asked her irritably.

Sokka and Zuko both looked at her expectantly. Sokka snickering, and Zuko trying hard not to. Katara threw something at Sokka hard enough to rebound off him and hit Zuko right after. "I probably deserved that," Sokka sighed, rubbing his head. Zuko just glared at her.

"These acorns are everywhere, Aang. That means the forest will grow back," Katara told the Avatar. "Every one of these will be a tall oak tree someday, and all the birds and animals that lived here will come back." She smiled comfortingly at the boy, who perked up.

"Thanks Katara," he said.

She smiled at him briefly, then her eyes widened, and they all turned to look at what had startled her. An old man, leaning heavily on a cane had emerged from the remnants of the once-mighty forest. "Hey," started Sokka.

Zuko overrode him, stepping forward aggressively. "Who are you?" he demanded, easing into a defensive posture, ready for any threatening move on the man's part.

He found himself roundly ignored, which had never sat well with him. Not as a prince, when he could have ordered the peasant executed for being insolent, and not as a homeless wanderer, when he could have done the man in himself any number of ways. He hated when people ignored his questions. "When I saw the flying bison, I thought it was impossible, but those markings . . . Are you the Avatar child?" he asked Aang.

Aang glanced at Katara, who nodded encouragingly at him. Zuko felt an urge, clearly echoed by Sokka, to smack his forehead with his hand. She was so trusting. It was going to get them into trouble. Aang nodded to the old man, admitting his identity.

"My village desperately needs your help," he told the boy. "If you and your companions will come with me, my village is nearby. Your bisons can rest there," he added.

"Of course," Aang told him. Apparently, having someone to help, even if he didn't know how yet, had cheered the kid even more.

As they set off toward the man's village, Zuko hurried to Katara's side, asking, "How can you just trust him? We don't even know him."

She shot him a slightly confused look. "Do we have any reason to not trust him?" she asked. The converse of his question made Zuko pause. "I mean," she continued. "We didn't know _you_ when we first met you, but you seem to have been pretty trustworthy." She smiled at him, and after a moment, he smiled back, but rather weakly.

_Maybe you shouldn't_, he thought bleakly. _I'm a firebender. Maybe I'm just like the others_.

The village really was very close. It was only the way it had been positioned between various rock outcroppings that would have kept a forest fire from consuming the village whole. It was reasonably defensible from fire, but much of it had still burned. As a small crowd approached, the old man told the people, "This young person is the Avatar."

Another man, this one looking like he might be in charge, stepped forward. "So the rumours of your return are true," he said, bowing. "It is the greatest honour of a lifetime to be in your presence."

Aang seemed a little taken aback. He bowed, then said, "Nice to meet you too." There was an awkward pause, which Aang finally broke by asking, "So . . . is there something I can help you with?"

"I'm not sure . . ." the man-in-charge said, looking pained.

"Our village is in crisis, he's our only hope," insisted the old man. He turned to Aang. "For the last few days at sunset a spirit monster comes and attacks our village. He is Hei-Bai, the black and white spirit."

"Why is it attacking you?" Sokka asked. The old man looked wearily out the door toward the sunset.

"We do not know, but each of the last three nights he has abducted one of our own. We are especially fearful because the winter solstice draws near."

The kids exchanged glances, but none of them knew what the old man meant. "What happens then?" Katara asked for them.

"As the solstice approaches, the natural world and the spirit world grow closer and closer until the line between them is blurred completely," he explained.

The guy in charge added, "Hei-Bai is already causing devastation and destruction. Once the solstice is here there is no telling what will happen."

Zuko frowned. He had heard once that his uncle Iroh had had some sort of encounter with the spirit world, and now he wished he knew more about his uncle's experience. There might have been useful information. Aang looked a lot like he was thinking something similar as he asked, "So, what do you want me to do exactly?"

"Good question," Zuko muttered. Katara hit him.

The old man ignored the byplay, and told Aang, "Who better to resolve a crisis between our world and the spirit world than the Avatar himself? You are the great bridge between man and spirits."

That was something of news to Zuko, who'd always thought the Avatar was plenty special being able to bend four elements and being reincarnated over and over. But a bridge between man and spirits? He looked sideways at Katara and Sokka, and noted that they didn't seem at all surprised by this information. Zuko frowned inwardly, really hoping they were just trying to seem unperturbed the way he was, rather than him being the only ignorant one there. He'd had the best education money could buy, and the idea that two Water Tribe peasants would know something important that he didn't really rankled.

Aang looked less than confident as he said weakly to the old man, "Right . . . that's me."

"Hey, 'great bridge guy', can I talk to you over here for a second?" Katara inquired, before leading Aang off out of earshot. The other two boys exchanged looks and followed. "Aang, you seem a little unsure about all this," Katara said once they were able to talk without being overheard.

"Yeah, that might be because I don't know anything at all about the spirit world. It's not like there's someone to teach me this stuff!" Aang snapped.

"Why . . ." Zuko started. Then he recalled that Aang had said he wasn't supposed to have been told about being the Avatar until he was sixteen. "Sorry," he said. The other three just looked at him oddly, and Zuko waved them off irritably saying, "I had a thought, but I realised it didn't matter, so I'm not saying anything else about it. Forget it, okay?"

"Yeesh," muttered Sokka. "Moody."

Zuko shot him a look that promised a pummelling later under the very thin premise of male bonding.

Katara had turned her back on them, and asked Aang, "So, can you help these people?"

"I have to try, don't I? Maybe whatever I have to do will just . . . come to me," Aang suggested. Zuko rolled his eyes at that, and was joined by Sokka. Momo hopped onto the boy's shoulder with a squawk, and Aang petted him, clearly looking for reassurance.

Katara had that serene face on that was so very annoying. Partly, just because Zuko wished he could believe in something as completely and purely as Katara believed in Aang. Partly, it was annoying because when she got like that, she was like a damn oracle, or his uncle, and likely to spout off the most ridiculous platitudes. "I think you can do it, Aang," she told him.

"Yeah, we're all gonna get eaten by a spirit monster," Sokka said with a sigh.

Zuko nodded, and hitched a thumb in his friend's direction. "What he said." Aang and Katara made identical huffing sounds and stalked off. "Want to spar before we die?" Zuko asked, dryly. "I still owe you for that 'moody' crack."

"What?" Sokka snarked. "It's _not_ that time of month for you, Lee?"

Zuko had been planning to have a proper lesson and sparring match with Sokka, but that was too much and they rapidly degenerated to rolling on the floor and wrestling like schoolchildren. Vaguely Zuko heard Katara saying something exasperated about boys, and Aang's protests that he was a boy, why did he get lumped in with them?

Aang finally announced irritably that he was going to head out to see if he could summon Hei-Bai and try to talk to the spirit. So Zuko reluctantly untangled himself from Sokka, and they went to the window to watch Aang with Katara.

At first the avatar just stood around at the village gate, shouting something no one could quite hear. Eventually Aang seemed to deflate a little and started back through the town. Quite suddenly, as though it had stepped out of some invisible doorway in the air, a giant creature, with black and white splotches all over it, travelling on six legs, but like a giant monkey, in that you could see the two front sets of legs were also arms.

At first, Aang didn't even seem to notice it was there. He stopped though, turned around and tried addressing the beast. It roared, choosing to ignore Aang and charged into the village, destroying things with its arms and blasting others with the lightning-like blue energy it seemed to breathe like fire.

As they all ducked to avoid flying debris, the guy-in-charge said, "The Avatar's methods are unusual."

"It doesn't seem too interested in what he's saying. Maybe we should go help him?" Sokka suggested.

Zuko added, "Sokka's right. Aang hasn't even finished training. He needs help." He made a move for the door, but the old man caught his arm.

"No, only the Avatar stands a chance against the Hei-Bai," insisted the villager.

"Aang will figure out the right thing to do, Lee," Katara told him, and put a comforting hand on his shoulder.

They watched as Aang chased the monster, shouting at it. Finally, he seemed to get its attention. Which turned out to be a bad thing, as it snarled and backhanded the boy into a roof. They saw his body slam into the tiles, then slide down bonelessly out of sight, presumably falling to the unforgiving ground below.

Zuko shook Katara off, hearing Sokka declare, "That's it! He needs help!" They both ran out the door, and with a few exchanged looks, approached the creature from opposite sides. Sokka flung his boomerang at Hei-Bai, while Zuko sent a blast of what was supposed to be an air slice at the animal's left side. However, his concentration wasn't all it could be, and what should have simply been hot air, had a definite red glow. Neither had an impact on it, but it made the monster stop for a moment, letting the two teens take up defensive positions on either side of Aang.

"We'll fight him together, Aang!" Sokka told him.

Zuko just drew his swords and settled into a defensive posture.

"I don't wanna fight him unless I . . . ah!" Aang's declaration was cut off as both Sokka and Zuko were snatched up by the spirit in one of its hands. The move was so sudden, Zuko lost his grip on the dao blades, and could only struggle, trying to get away from Hei-Bai. Behind him, Sokka was kicking and struggling as well, frightened shouts escaped the other boy.

"Aang! Over here!" called Sokka.

The Avatar was racing after them, Zuko could see him gaining on them hanging from his glider. "Hang on, guys!"

Then everything went dark.

When Zuko woke up, he was lying on a beach. The water was lapping gently at the shore, the sky over it deep black, with no stars and only a moon overhead. The moon wasn't even reflected in the water, it was just . . . there. To the other side, there was a field of cooled lava, the rocks rippled and black like the water, but these were stone, and still. The sky overhead there was a fiery red, the sun's light beating down on the rocks.

The beach where he stood lay between the two, neither hot nor cold. Zuko frowned, slowly standing and looking behind and ahead of him. The beach seemed to stretch out ahead and behind him, like a path leading between the ocean and the frightening landscape on the other side. He glanced up at the sky again, finally seeing something that looked like clouds, but they appeared and disappeared like a mirage as he stared.

"It's interesting, isn't it?" said a voice behind him.

Zuko whipped around, seeing no one, but his eyes suddenly fell on a tiger, pacing slowly up to him from the fiery side of the beach. He took a step back before settling into a bending stance, and then sending a blast of fire at the tiger's feet to ward it off.

At least, he tried to send a blast of fire. Nothing happened.

Suddenly truly frightened, Zuko reached into himself for his inner flame, the power that made him a firebender, and felt . . . nothing. _Fine time to finally get my wish_, he thought, sardonically. _I'm finally not a firebender any more, and there's a tiger about to eat me._

"You can't bend here, you know," said the tiger. Somehow, its lips moving to form words, the voice from before emerging from its mouth.

"What?" Zuko said. "Who . . . what . . .?" He wasn't even sure what he should ask this apparition. "Where am I?" he finally asked.

The tiger settled down in a comfortable-looking sprawl on the rocks, and said, "You're in the Spirit World. Hei-Bai brought you here. You, the Water Tribe boy and the others from that village."

"So my real body is somewhere in the real world?" Zuko asked. "All our bodies are just hidden somewhere the villagers can't or haven't found?"

"No," said the tiger.

"What do you mean, no?" Zuko demanded. "Are you saying the villagers know or found the bodies of the people who were taken by Hei-Bai?"

"No," said the tiger.

"What does that mean?" Zuko asked again.

The tiger sighed. "Your body is right here. You're in it on this beach. In the Spirit World."

"But . . . how?" Zuko asked. "My uncle said that only the human spirit could travel to the Spirit Realms." He looked around, a little helplessly, "He should know."

The tiger seemed to shrug. "Normally that's so, but a powerful enough spirit, and anger has made Hei-Bai _quite_ powerful, can pull someone bodily into the spirit world. It all depends on the situation you know. Different rules apply at different times to different people and different spirits."

"That makes no sense," Zuko told the tiger. "Either things work a particular way, or they don't."

"Now you're not making sense," the tiger told him. "Take your human rules. If a man kills another man, what should be done with him?"

"He should be executed, of course," Zuko answered, already irritable. He could tell this was going to turn into one of those interminable lessons in wisdom his uncle had been so fond of. He hated those.

"Maybe so," said the tiger. "But what if he killed the other man because that man was going to kill his wife and children?"

This could not merely be going to a discussion of grey areas of morality, could it? Zuko thought. He answered, because he had no other idea what to do about a talking tiger. "I suppose nothing should happen to him, in that case, since he was killing the other in defence of his family."

"And what if the man killed was attempting to gain vengeance for his son?" the tiger shot back.

Zuko sighed, and sat down on the sand. Perhaps he would get something out of this. If not, well, he had nothing better to do. There was nothing visible, and being in the spirit world seemed to explain a great many things all too well. "Then . . . I suppose execution would still be warranted for the other man's son's death, but not for the death of the man."

"And if the son was killed in a war between the peoples of the two men? A battle in which the one man killed the other's son, not out of any personal enmity, but merely as a duty because he was a soldier of his people?" the tiger asked him.

"Then the man who attacked the other was in the wrong and got what he deserved," Zuko said. "I suppose there's a more philosophical way to put that, but I have a feeling that's not your point," he sighed. "I know that every moral question has many issues that must be resolved, and most of them can't be resolved simply. Every situation has a context that must be examined in order to reach a proper understanding."

"Very good," the tiger said. "It's nice to not have to explain that." It – no, he – the tiger was definitely male, stretched, arching his back and then settling back down again. "So, you can see that rules change with the situation."

"But it's not the same thing," Zuko replied, stubbornly. "Those are human rules, and while there are some things that are wrong, everyone sees things differently and the rules are set arbitrarily to match the ethics of the largest number of people." He leaned forward, interested in the debate in spite of himself. "The rules of nature or of the world don't change. I mean, yes, wood lights on fire, and if there's water in the wood it won't because there's too much water, but ultimately, you can figure out the rules and they all work consistently with each other."

"Not bad," said the tiger. "But you're forgetting something. This is the Spirit World. It is not a place, not in the sense you're used to."

"I don't understand," Zuko said, frowning.

His feline acquaintance sighed himself. "The same way human rules are just constructs of the human mind, so too are the rules of the Spirit World merely constructs of the spirits here. This is a realm of thought, not of earth."

"So . . . I'm just . . . imagining a beach?" Zuko asked.

"Not exactly," the tiger admitted. "Your mind is not the only one constructing this reality, after all. There's myself, too," he said. "But there are others. Like her." The tiger's head tilted in the direction of the water, and Zuko saw a form racing just under the surface before flying out of the water, arcing gracefully in the air and reentering the water with barely a splash. Whatever 'she' was continued to gambol playfully, until Zuko finally was able to see it was a tiger-seal.

"Took you long enough," the seal said, he voice cheerful. Where the tiger's voice was soothing and soft, the seal's voice was loud and bubbly.

"We can't tell him anything if he doesn't understand enough to begin with," the tiger said, lolling on his back for a moment.

"You're taking too long," the seal said with good-natured false irritation. She lolled about herself, an odd sort of reflection of the tiger.

A thought occurred to Zuko, and he asked, "What about Sokka and the villagers? Can I find them?"

"No," chorused the animals. The seal continued. "You can't because this is your spirit journey," she informed him. "They each have their own paths to walk, and none of you can interfere with anyone else's path. Not even the Avatar."

"Aang is here?" Zuko asked, eyes wide. "Is he-"

The tiger cut him off. "The Avatar entered our world through meditation and a bit of a push from his past self, Avatar Roku. Only his spirit is here, and he too has a particular path he must travel."

There was a moment of silence, but then the animals' words sank in. "Does that mean I have some sort of . . . of spirit quest I have to go on?" Zuko asked.

"Something like that," the seal told him. "You have a choice, Prince Zuko. You can no more become an airbender than you can become a waterbender."

"I know that," Zuko snapped. "I'm stuck with being the monster that I am."

"Monster are you, now?" the tiger asked, dryly. "However did you come to that conclusion?"

Zuko was on his feet, furious, "What else could I be? All I ever see, all I ever hear about, is how evil firebenders are, how horrible they are. My own mother thinks I'm worthless because of it."

"Your father is quite proud of his firebending," the seal pointed out.

Zuko glared. "You mean a despot and a sadist. Why should I be proud of anything I hold in common with him?"

"Why shouldn't you be?" she asked him. "His intentions are not good, but he is a strong leader and a powerful bender. Both are things to aspire to."

Zuko turned away from her. Beneath that cheerful exterior was a cold heart. He could see that. There was no passion there, just . . . ice. The tiger, while unwelcoming on the exterior, had a comforting understanding in his gaze. "Why shouldn't I try to be like the airbenders? They're peaceful, and . . . and I'm part airbender. Why shouldn't I try?"

"If you want to be like people with no drive who run away from everything," the seal cheerfully told him, "You can try, but you're too driven to really pull that off."

The tiger looked him in the eye, and said, "You should always try out the aspects of the other elements, certainly. You must understand, at your core, you are a child of fire."

"I don't want to be!" Zuko shouted. "I want to be . . . anything else. I'd take not being a bender at all to being a firebender!"

"You could certainly stop being a bender," the seal told him.

Zuko whipped around to stare at her. "What?"

"Tahl," growled the tiger.

"What?" she said. "If he were to drink my water, it would put out his inner flame, and he would cease to be a firebender." She paused, tilting her head consideringly. "Of course, you wouldn't be a bender at all, but . . ."

Tempted, Zuko stepped toward the water. The tiger snarled, and Zuko turned to look at him. "You truly think your inner flame to be evil?" he demanded. "Why would the spirits create four nations, each one part of the balance if all the people of one were evil?"

"I don't know!" Zuko snapped. "Maybe it's because evil is needed to balance the good of the other nations-"

"Then why three to one?" asked Tahl, the seal, curiously. "Surely there ought to be another evil nation so as to provide true balance."

They were both toying with him. It was the only explanation Zuko could think of while his dream of no longer even being a firebender was dangled in front of him. "I don't know, okay?" he said. "All I know is that firebenders are everything that's wrong with the world, and I don't want to be a part of that any more." He wasn't thinking of any other possible consequences as he lunged at the water, dipping his hand in to collect some to drink.

It was ice cold. It was so cold his fingers briefly burned, ached and then went numb. He still pulled the hand to his mouth and swallowed before he could consider the consequences. For a moment, he felt as though he'd had the most refreshing drink imaginable.

Then the cold spread from his hand and his mouth, radiating into his body. He was so cold, and he felt his limbs weakening as the cold worked its way through him. His body gave out and he fell to the sand. Suddenly Tahl's head loomed into view. "Something Hae and I forgot to mention," she told him casually. "Your inner flame is a part of your essence. It's essential to you. Without it, you'll die."

He tried to say something, but he couldn't move. Vaguely he thought that maybe this was appropriate. At least he'd never give in to his inner flame and do something horrible. But he was so cold . . .

Slowly, he became aware again, feeling the numbness recede. Zuko sat up and looked around, and rapidly realised he was lying on the baking hot stone of the tiger's side of the beach. The tiger was next to him, looking comfortable again. He didn't know why, but Zuko slid a hand into the tiger's fur, and felt beautiful warmth run up from that hand and infuse his whole body. For another few moments he sat and luxuriated in the heat, but soon it began to become uncomfortable, and then just too hot. A little longer, and Zuko desperately scrambled back down to the beach, before the heat could burn him. His hands were still raw and blistered by the time he was safe.

Waiting by the water was Tahl. "I'm sorry," she told him. "But you had to understand. Fire is a part of who you are. You cannot simply rid yourself of it." She darted forward, and the water surged over his burned hands. Zuko flinched. But instead of freezing him, the water healed the burns and no more.

"I don't understand," he said.

"Hae tried to explain," she told him, gesturing with her head at the tiger on the rocks. "You were too determined to do away with a part of yourself to listen."

Hae spoke, his tail flicking. "What I have been trying to tell you, is that, like you have seen with water, fire is more than one thing. Water freezes and destroys, just as much as it gives life. Do you fear the hearthfire in your home? No. Fire cooks food, it brings warmth. The Water Tribes have fires in their homes. Would you say those were evil in essence?"

"No," Zuko replied. This time he waited.

"The elements are not intrinsically evil. Each has a place in the balance. Earth provides the substance of the world. Without earth, there is no physical being. Water is the engine of change. It is the element that moves the world and the beings within it. Air provides the breath and spirit of life. Without air, there is no soul, no art, no love, no feeling."

"And fire?" Zuko asked. He had never heard the elements described in this way. The firebenders he'd grown up around described fire as the dominant element and the others as inferior. The airbenders had declared fire to be the most inferior due to the violent nature of its people, and air the most superior for the spiritual nature of the Nomads. He had heard the earthbenders declare theirs most superior because of their immovable nature. No one had ever mentioned the way the elements worked together to make the world.

Hae seemed to smile. "Fire is inborn in the firebender because fire is the energy that drives the world. Without fire, there would be no life, because all life requires that spark of energy and warmth to live."

Tahl added, "Without fire, the water would all be ice. Water's greatest gift, changeability, would not exist, because it would be like stone."

"What the Fire Nation has forgotten," Hae told Zuko, "Is that without earth, there is nothing for fire to move, and without water, there is no way to make the earth move." The tiger looked sadly at him. "Without air . . . without creativity and spirit, there is no passion. No fire."

Hae leaned forward. "You must learn to temper your drive with the other elements," he told Zuko. "But never forget, Prince Zuko, you are a child of the sun. There is no evil in ambition. It is _you_ who choose your actions, not your element."

"You must teach your people to turn their strength and purpose away from destruction," Tahl told him. "A fire can be used to destroy, but a blacksmith uses fire to create. Teach them to use that fire for creation."

On the beach, a distance away, Zuko watched as a small stand of bamboo trees suddenly sprang out of the sand, forming a small clump of foliage. He felt drawn to it, and his feet moved irresistibly toward them. "One more thing," Hae told him. "You cannot exist in the water alone, nor could you exist in my realm alone. All humans must, in the end, exist in a balance themselves, and cannot be more than a little of their element." He had entered the little stand of trees, and was only just able to force himself to pause. "Never forget that you are human first, Zuko. Not a firebender, not a prince, not the airbender's son, but human."

Then he was pulled inexorably forward, and found himself stepping out into the town square that he had been in only . . . how long had he been in the spirit world? To the side, he saw Sokka, looking confused, being hugged by Katara. Then she spotted him, and flung herself at him. "Lee!"

"What happened?" Sokka asked, looking dazed. Zuko couldn't blame him. He felt fairly dazed himself.

Katara pulled back, smiling happily and said, "You were trapped in the Spirit World for 24 hours. How are you feeling?"

"Like I seriously need to use the bathroom!" Sokka said, then sprinted off.

Then Zuko realised something. "Uh . . . yeah." He rushed off, hoping Sokka knew where the bathroom was because his body was really feeling the effects of being put on pause for a whole day.

Both were feeling quite relieved when they exited the bathroom, but Zuko stopped when Sokka tugged on his arm. "Uh . . . Lee?"

"Yeah?"

"When you were in the . . . uh . . . Spirit World. What happened with you?"

Zuko paused, remembering what he'd been told, but there was a lot he didn't want to say to Sokka. Just because maybe not all firebenders were evil, and just because _he_ might not be evil, didn't mean he wanted to tell everyone that he was actually a firebender. It really wouldn't go over well at all. "A tiger and a tiger seal had me trapped on a beach and talked philosophy at me for a while. You?"

"There was this sabre-toothed moose lion, and a turtle duck, and they kept telling me that it wasn't bending or warrior skills that made me special. Or something like that."

Zuko shook his head, and sighed. "Why don't they just say something useful? Like where we could find an earthbending or firebending teacher for Aang."

"Or where there's a buried treasure so we never have to worry about anything ever again!" Sokka said enthusiastically. "Or hunting tips. Shouldn't a sabre-toothed moose lion know a lot about hunting?"

"Probably should," Zuko agreed. That was the nice thing about Sokka. He didn't have to think hard all the time when he was hanging out with the guy. They caught up with Katara and Aang quickly, and got filled in on what happened while they were talking with spirit animals.

Just as the two had finished the story, the guy-in-charge joined the four kids. "Thank you, Avatar. If there only were a way to repay you for what you've done," he said.

"You could give us some supplies and some money," Sokka said, practically.

Katara glared at him. "Sokka!" she said, and elbowed her brother in the ribs.

"He's got a point," Zuko told her. "We're still a distance away from the North Pole, and we're going to run out of money eventually."

She just glared at them both.

"It would be an honour to help you prepare for your journey," the villager told them, and left, calling out to a few people on the way about travelling supplies.

Katara sighed, clearly deciding it was too late to do anything about the crass materialism of the two teenaged boys, and turned to Aang. She said, "I'm so proud of you, Aang. You figured out what to do all on your own."

"Actually, I did have a little help. And there's something else," he said, looking down at his feet and drawing designs in the dirt with the toes of his shoes.

"What is it?" Sokka asked. The look on his face said, _Now what?_

"I need to talk to Roku and I think I've found a way to contact his spirit," Aang said.

Zuko's eyes went wide, his eyebrows shot up, and he heard himself make a vague noise of disbelief. Katara hit him, and said, "That's great!"

"Creepy, but great," amended Sokka. Zuko was happy to note that Sokka looked about as enthusiastic as Zuko felt.

"There's a temple on a crescent shaped island, and if I go there on the solstice I'll be able to speak with him," Aang told them. Zuko closed his eyes, praying to every deity he'd ever heard of, plus any that he hadn't that were willing to listen. _Please anything but that._

"But the solstice is tomorrow," Katara objected.

"Yeah, and there's one more problem," Aang added. _Please,_ thought Zuko. _Not Crescent Moon Isle_. "The island is in the Fire Nation."

_Dammit_.


	6. Avatar Roku: Winter Solstice Part 2

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: This is going to be a lot shorter than the last chapter. There are several reasons, but ultimately, it's because less is going to happen that needs writing down in this one than in the last chapter. Yes, I'm having Sokka and Zuko develop a very close friendship. For the record, I'm saying this now, there is no Sokka/Zuko pairing coming up. Period, zip zilch nada. They're friends, they will have a very close and good understanding of each other, but there is no romance or smooching going to be happening between them. The closest I would ever get to that would be a _Supernatural_-like running gag about people thinking they're a couple when they're not. But it would be a _joke_.

I just wanted to head any queries on that off at the pass now.

* * *

After watching Aang fight with Appa to get the bison moving, Zuko could almost forget that the boy was proposing they cross into Fire Nation territory in order to speak with a dead previous life of the avatar. Almost.

Finally, Sokka intervened. "I think his big butt is trying to tell you something," he said.

"Please don't go, Aang," Katara pleaded. "The world can't afford to lose you to the Fire Nation. Neither can I." Zuko looked away. He couldn't add anything to the conversation.

Aang turned sharply toward them, almost angrily saying, "But I have to talk to Avatar Roku to find out what my vision means. I need to get to the Fire Temple before the sun sets on the Solstice. That's today." He leaped onto Appa's head, taking the reins and turning the bison toward the village gates.

"We're not letting you go into the Fire Nation, Aang," Katara said.

"At least not without your friends. We got your back," Sokka added. "Right Lee?"

Zuko looked away, ashamed. They were going to see the sages at the temple. He would be recognised as the prince. What would he do then? "I . . . I can't," he said. "Anywhere else, but I can't go back," he said softly. "I . . ." he trailed off. What could he tell them? That he was afraid they'd find out who he truly was and hate him? That if people knew the banished prince travelled with the Avatar, any Fire Nation search would double? That he didn't want to look at everything he'd failed at and lost? "I'm sorry," he whispered, finally.

"I see," Katara said, and her lips tightened. "So what _are_ you going to do?"

"I . . . I'll meet you, after?" Zuko asked. He didn't want to lose them. "I mean, if you still want me to go with you."

Sokka seemed to see something, and said, "Okay. Then we'll meet back up at Shen Lu on the other side of the inlet?" He smiled encouragingly at Zuko.

Katara shot her brother a look, but he ignored it, and reached a hand down to Zuko. Shakily, Zuko smiled, and clasped his friend's hand. "Shen Lu it is," he said. "Good luck, Aang."

Aang looked a little confused, but just said, "Okay. See you in a couple days, Lee."

"It's a long journey to the Crescent Island," said the village headman. He handed Aang a package. "You'll have to fly fast to have any chance of making it before sundown. Good luck."

"Thank you for your-" Aang started to thank him, but was cut off.

"Go!" insisted the villager, and pointed to the West.

They took off, leaving Zuko standing there, surrounded by curious villagers. "Why did you not go with your friends?" asked the headman. Shuga rumbled significantly from behind him. She'd stayed, a fact for which he was devoutly grateful, but he had the feeling she was put out with him leaving the others.

"I can't," Zuko told them. "If I went, they'd be in more danger. Someone might recognize me, and I don't want to risk them." The headman pulled him aside, into a shadowed doorway.

"Or yourself?" he asked Zuko dryly. "We are close to the Fire Nation here, and we hear a lot."

He whipped around and stared. "What does that mean?" His palms began to sweat, and he felt his heart pounding.

"It means, that a fair few merchants travel through here, and have brought tales of the Crown Prince, and the scar he received from his father for his treachery to the Fire Nation," replied the man. He stepped closer, and gave a significant look at the scar that covered so much of Zuko's face. "A scar that crosses the boy's face, like a comet, over the left side of his face."

Zuko stumbled back a few steps. He'd never been identified in the Earth Kingdom. He'd stayed away from the colonies for just that reason. Here was a whole village of people who had every reason to hate him and his people, and they knew who he was. "What do you want?" he asked.

The old man who'd first come to them, asking for help with Hei-Bai, stepped out of the building where Zuko and the headman had been talking, clearly having been eavesdropping. "Nothing, your highness. You do not need to fear us. No one here has seen anything to show you are not genuine in your desire to help the Avatar."

Zuko sagged back against Shuga. "Then why did you . . ." he stopped. He still had enough pride that he wasn't going to admit he'd been terrified he was about to face a raging mob.

"You're going to have to tell them the truth some time," the old man said gently. "Sooner would, perhaps, be better than later."

Shuga irritably stomped over and got her teeth into the back of Zuko's shirt. With a skilled flip of her head, he was suddenly sprawled out on her saddle. Before he could recover, she'd taken off after Appa. "Shuga!" he shouted at her. "No!" She just rumbled in satisfaction. "Fine. But when they all hate me, I expect you to stick with _me_, and not your new boyfriend." Somewhere deep down though, he was relieved someone else had made the decision for him. Even if it was a seven-ton bison.

They flew fast, but Appa had more endurance than Shuga did, and they only managed to begin catching up because of the air current maps he'd seen once, that had been made over the past twenty years by airbenders hoping to improve their escape routes. It was enough that he and Shuga were able to catch up to Appa, just as the others decided to run the blockade. "Those blockheads," Zuko muttered.

The Fire Nation navy was firing on Appa, and as they ducked and dodged the fireballs, Sokka went flying off the saddle. A tug at the reins, and Shuga was coming up under Sokka, catching him while she lined herself up with Appa. "Thanks," Sokka told him. "I thought you weren't coming."

"So did I," Zuko said. "Apparently, my bison prefers Appa's company to mine." He glared down at her. "And I'd better not see anything indicating that you're calving anytime soon!" he shouted at her.

She rumbled a greeting to Appa, cheerfully ignoring Zuko, then whirled around in the air, and used her tail to blast one of the fireballs out of their path.

"Seriously?" Zuko snapped at her. "Stop showing off. If I die because you can't control yourself around Appa, I'm never forgiving you."

"Whatever you say," Sokka said, and then went back to clinging to the saddle for his life.

Just as they were about to cross the line of the boats, two of the fireballs came launching at them from one of the ships. Perfectly aligned. There was no way to get Shuga or Appa out of the way without harm. Zuko saw Aang leap forward, off Appa's head, throwing himself into a perfectly formed kick.

He saw that all in an instant. There wasn't time for more thought. He couldn't block it with fire. He knew that a fire blast would cause the ball to fragment in a way that would be dangerous for everyone. But if he took a page out of Aang's book . . .

It was a textbook fireblast kick. Elementary for a firebender, but with his concentration honed to a fine point, the need for survival acting as a better focus than anything else ever could, Zuko leaped up, slamming his leg forward, a wave of pure, hot air leaving a wavy trail in the air, blasting through the fireball, creating a second perfect ring to match the one Aang had created in destroying the one hurtling toward Appa.

And then they were past the blockade, and Zuko felt vaguely dizzy. He'd never created a blast of air that strong and concentrated before. Sokka pulled him into the saddle, saying something about smelling salts and fainting, but Zuko couldn't hear over the buzzing in his ears. Trusting in Shuga to keep up with Appa, he just leaned back and breathed.

"You okay?" Sokka asked him, looking concerned.

Zuko took a deep breath, let it out, and then answered. "Remember how I told you all that I'm not that strong a bender?" Sokka nodded. "That may have been pretty easy for Aang, but I've never done anything like that before."

"Oh," Sokka said. "You need a minute?"

"Please. Just . . . keep an eye on how Shuga's flying for me, would you?" Zuko asked. He let his eyes close, and just relaxed into a sprawl.

He felt Sokka's hand clap him on the shoulder, the other boy said, "Sure," and then Zuko heard him moving toward Shuga's head. Now that the excitement was over, though, he felt the same sick fear of discovery he'd had back at Senlin village. He must have fallen asleep, because suddenly they were landing with a bump, and Shuga just rolled onto her side, sending Zuko and Sokka sprawling on the ground.

"Ow," Zuko shot her a look. "I know you're tired, but you couldn't have waited until we were off?"

She just rumbled, rolled back to her feet briefly, and made her way over to Appa, snuggling up to the larger bison. "Awwww! You must be tired!" Katara said in a voice verging on baby talk as she rubbed Shuga's tummy, then made her way over to scratch at one of Appa's favourite spots.

"Nope," Sokka said, under the delusional impression that Katara had been talking to him. He was doing squats and stretches, and Zuko found himself rolling his eyes, sharing a look of exasperation and amusement with Aang. "I'm good," Sokka continued. "Refreshed and ready to take on some firebenders."

"I was talking to Appa and Shuga," Katara grated out at her brother.

Sokka stopped dead. "Oh," he said. "Well . . . I was . . . talking to Momo." His bid to preserve his dignity failed, and Zuko snickered.

They started up the long path to the temple, the siblings pulling ahead. Aang fell a little behind and said, "I saw you after the fireballs. Was it that hard for you?" he asked.

Zuko flushed. "I . . . I said I'm not that strong a bender," he told Aang. "I just . . . I have a lot of trouble with my bending. You saw how much trouble I had back when I went after those soldiers when Katara was being taken. I'm just a bad airbender." He looked away, expecting the same mocking laughter he'd always gotten at the enclave.

He was surprised when Aang said, "Well, maybe I can help. I mean, you said that your technique was copied from firebending, and isn't actually an air technique. The form on your kick was pretty off for airbending." He smiled encouragingly. "Maybe you just need a different teacher." Aang added, "Sometimes it just takes a while for a student to find the right teacher."

"Thank you," Zuko said, horrified to feel himself choking up. "No one ever really tried to help before."

"Well, that's a problem right there," Aang said. "If you don't get any help, how can you get better?" Then he patted Zuko's arm and bounded ahead.

Zuko plodded on for a couple minutes in silence. He felt excited about learning bending for the first time in a while. He'd always loved bending. He loved the feeling of moving his element, the joy of feeling his inner flame expand upward from his chi, into his lungs, then out and down his limbs. It was exhilarating. He'd just always hated learning how. He'd hated learning from his teachers at the palace, because someone inevitably brought up Azula and how she could already do this or that. He hated learning from his uncle because the man may have been brilliant, but it was so aggravating to constantly be told things he already knew, like he was a baby, or like they were philosophy.

Airbending had never been better, because he'd always had to be so controlled, there was rarely enough force behind his moves while the teacher was going over something the first time. It was doubly hard because he could always hear the other kids in the class muttering and laughing at him behind his back.

But Aang hadn't laughed just because Zuko wasn't as strong as he was, and maybe he'd learn something he could use.

Eventually they reached the top, the four of them crouching beside a wall near the temple. "I don't see any guards," Sokka said, nervously. Zuko was inclined to agree with the nerves. Why weren't there any guards?

"The Fire Nation must have abandoned the temple when Avatar Roku died," Katara suggested.

Aang was more concerned with his deadline. "It's almost sundown. We'd better hurry."

They dashed up the stairs and into the temple. They'd crossed the threshold, beginning to try to get their bearings, when Zuko heard a small scrape of sandal on stone. "Wait, I think I heard something," he hissed at the others.

When another scrape sounded, they all heard it that time and turned around. Behind them were five men, middle-aged or older. Fire sages, in those odd robes and ridiculous hats. One stepped forward. "We are the fire sages. Guardians of the temple of the Avatar," he told them.

Zuko was reaching for Aang, even as the boy said, "Great! I'm the Avatar."

"We know," the old man said, and sent a fireball straight at Aang. Zuko barely knocked him out of the way, and came up in a bending pose.

"I'll hold them off!" shouted Aang, "Run!"

Sokka and Katara took off, but now that he was here, Zuko wasn't going to back down. His fake airbending wasn't very strong at complex moves, but he could manage simple blocks and strikes. In spite of his concentration, the air he blasted was getting hotter and hotter, but he wasn't going to stop fighting. He was surprised when his opponent went flying, and Aang grabbed him and pulled him after the Water siblings. "C'mon Lee!"

They hurried down the corridor, and managed to catch up to Katara and Sokka. "Follow me!" Aang shouted at them, leading the group down a corridor.

"Do you know where you're going?" Zuko and Sokka asked at the same time.

"No," Aang told them sanguinely, then raced around a corner. They were about to follow, not really having a better plan, when Aang hurtled back around that corner. "Wrong way!" he yelled as a fire sage rounded the corner, right on his heels.

"Come back!" shouted the sage.

"Why?" Zuko groused.

And suddenly they were at a dead end, and the sage was right behind them. Aang and Zuko stepped forward, both taking on bending stances to protect the other two. "I don't want to fight you," said the sage. "I am your friend."

Zuko snorted, and Sokka spoke up from behind him, "Firebenders aren't our friends."

They were all surprised when the sage took a step forward and then dropped to his knees. It was an indefensible position, and Zuko stared. No one at his father's court would ever have put themselves in such a situation. "I know why you're here, Avatar," the man said.

"You do?" Aang asked.

"Yes," said the sage, standing. "You wish to speak to Avatar Roku. I can take you to him."

"How?"

The sage pulled one of the lamps on the wall aside, pressed his hand to a small depression and sent a burst of fire into it, triggering a secret door. Zuko glanced over, set the knowledge of how he accessed the hidden catch in his memory, then flinched as the man's eyes seemed to pause on his face. Before he could say anything, a tumult in the corridors nearby caught his attention, and the sage said, "Time is running out. Quickly!"

With no other choices, they followed him into the tunnel. Zuko mostly ignored the discussion going on around him. He was back in the Fire Nation, and despite everything, a small part of him was happy just to be home. He could feel the heat of the lava in the tunnels with him, and a small part of his mind wondered absently if he could bend it like a waterbender would bend water. More than that, though, he could feel the fire in the molten rock, and it was _wonderful_.

Chancing a glance at the others, he saw that Katara in particular looked uncomfortable. It wasn't surprising, he supposed. She was a waterbender, and if there was a place that was more her elemental opposite than a temple in the fire nation on top of a volcano, he couldn't think of one. "How are you doing?" he asked.

She looked up at him, startled. "What do you mean?"

"Well," he said, hesitantly, "You're a waterbender, and this is pretty . . . devoid of water."

Katara smiled at him, a little weakly, but said. "I'm fine. It's just really different."

"It is at that," he said.

"Why did you change your mind?" she asked, suddenly.

"What-" he started. Then he recalled the scene at Senlin. She'd been so disappointed at him. "The village headman said a few things, and . . . Shuga kidnapped me," he added wryly. "I think I'd better tell Aang to keep an eye out so we don't have to deal with bison calves before we're done helping Aang get trained."

"Whatever happened, I'm glad you changed your mind," Katara told him with a smile.

They finally started climbing back up again, on a staircase that wound around the inside of an underground tower, until they finally emerged in a hall, near a giant set of double doors decorated with five dragon heads. As they emerged, Zuko, who had tuned out Shyu (as he knew the history of the fire sages and Sozin's decree that they should be subject to the Fire Lord, not the authority of the spirits), caught the words, "I never wanted to serve the Fire Lord. When I learned you were coming, I knew I would have to betray the other Sages."

It was almost a reflex. He was of the Fire Nation, and there were terms of address you gave people who had done you significant favours, particularly when you were royalty. The man was honourable and was following his vocation as best he could when the Fire Lord was making it well-nigh impossible. They reached the hall, and Zuko brought a hand over fist, bowing his head to the proper incline of a prince to other high nobility. "Your wisdom and effort bring honour to your house and family, Wise One," he said, the formalities coming easily to him, even after so long away from court. "Should you wish a boon of us, all that can reasonably be granted, will be so."

They were all staring at him, and suddenly Zuko felt sick. What had he just done? The look on the sage's face made it clear he'd just recognised the banished prince. "I-" the man started to kneel.

"No!" Zuko snapped. "Don't. I'm not . . . I'm not important. You only kneel before royalty and I'm not . . ." _Not any more_, a bitter voice in his head whispered. He dragged the man to his feet.

The other man's eyes narrowed, but he said, carefully. "Of course not, my lord."

Zuko made a disgusted sound. "Wow, Lee," Sokka said. "You weren't kidding when you said your Dad was high up. Some random sage recognised you."

Shyu looked a little amused. "Yes," he said. "_Lee_ is quite recognisable to some in the Fire Nation. His banishment caused much talk."

"I'm sure it did," Zuko ground out. "I'm also sure the real reason was never bandied about."

"No," Shyu said. "The Fire Lord merely indicated there had been some sort of treason."

Bitter, Zuko couldn't stop himself. "I suppose it _was_ treasonous to object to the use of a company of teenagers as cannon fodder, and then to disobey the Fire Lord's command to attack him in an Agni Kai I was given to understand would be against the general who proposed the plan." He sternly controlled himself. "Never mind."

"You've met the _Fire Lord_?" Sokka asked, sounding awed. "Is he scary and ugly like people say?"

"I've heard he looks a great deal like his son," Shyu said, still looking rather amused.

"There's a resemblance," Zuko admitted. "I can't really say that I've paid attention to that kind of thing."

Aang was dancing with impatience. "That's great and I'm sorry Lee, but I need to get in to see Avatar Roku."

"Right," Shyu said, then blanched. "Oh, no."

"Now what?" Sokka asked.

It turned out the doors needed firebenders to open. More than they had, even if Zuko admitted to being a firebender and they managed to teach Aang how to do a fireblast in the short time available. Sokka's plan of explosives, which Zuko thought was tremendously creative, didn't work and they were forced to get Aang in by tricking the sages into opening the doors.

They had managed to subdue the four other sages and were waiting on Aang's return from inside the room. The eldest asked from where he was tied up with his own sash, "Why did you help the Avatar, Shyu? Why betray your own people?"

"Because it was once the Sages' duty. It is still our duty," Shyu told the man.

Sarcastic clapping echoed through the hall. "What a moving and heartfelt performance. I'm certain the Fire Lord will understand when you explain why you betrayed him."

When Zuko saw who it was, all he could think was that he was in for it now. "Commander Zhao!" gasped the first sage. A quick gesture from the military man and they were surrounded by soldiers. Sokka and Katara were quickly dragged off to the side and chained to a post. The soldiers holding Zuko looked uncertain, and didn't take him right away.

Zhao turned, and then caught sight of Zuko. "Well, well, well, isn't this a surprise? Pr-"

"What do you want, Zhao?" Zuko snapped, hoping to keep the others from knowing the truth.

"I _was_ curious about how the Avatar had gotten a second flying bison and why he was trying to run our blockade, but now I'm curious about-"

Zuko cut him off again. "Maybe I happen to think the Avatar should be allowed to restore balance to the world, instead of supporting a sadistic tyrant who wants to rule the world."

"That's high treason," said Zhao. "I'd think you'd be more careful about what you said."

"It's a little late for me to be cautious now, don't you think?" Zuko told him. "It's not like my father would ever have accepted me back."

"True," Zhao said, starting to circle Zuko like a pygmy puma circling its prey. "I suppose your weakness just repulses him that much. I know your sister would never have disgraced herself this way."

"Weakness!" Katara said, clearly appalled. "Just because he doesn't want innocent people to die for no reason?"

"Katara!" Zuko said sharply. "Just . . . don't." He sent her a pleading look.

Zhao laughed. "She does have spunk. I can see why you'd want to keep her around." He leaned forward, cupping Katara's chin in his hand, tightening his grip when she tried to pull away. "Now, now, none of that."

"What are you going to do with us?" Zuko asked.

Zhao sent him a nasty smile. "Well, first, my men and I are going to wait here and when the Avatar comes out, we'll capture him. Then I'm going to take you, the traitor and the two peasants along with him back to the Fire Lord. I'm sure he will be delighted to receive you all." He glanced at the men holding Zuko. "Tie him up along with the other three."

"How're we going to get Aang out of this?" Katara asked, anxiously.

Sokka asked a question that was weighing just as heavily on Zuko's mind. "How're _we_ going to get out of this?" Zuko ignored them both, trying to meditate. Maybe a solution would present itself. Maybe . . .

"When those doors open, unleash all your firebending power," Zhao said. He and the others settled into simple stances and waited. The tension in the hall grew. It worsened as the door began to crack open, blinding light spilling out across the floor and into the room. "Ready . . ." Zhao said.

Two glowing eyes appeared in the darkness that lay beyond the door, and Zuko had the odd feeling that the blinding light was coming from those eyes alone. "Aang! No!" Katara cried. Zuko couldn't watch.

"Fire!" shouted Zhao. For a moment, a wave of heat and red light filled the space between the open doors and the firebending soldiers. But suddenly, the light was pulled into a swirling ring around an old man, who was slowly emerging from the room.

Shyu gasped. "Avatar Roku," he said.

Avatar Roku took the fire that had been blasted toward him by so many firebenders without so much as a hint of strain, and sent it back out again. Somehow, he used it to blast away the soldiers that had come with Zhao, along with Zhao himself, at the same time, melting away the chains holding Zuko, Shyu, Sokka and Katara to the columns. "Avatar Roku's going to destroy the temple! We have to get out of here!" Shyu said. He seemed to be right, as Roku had begun to bend the stone of the temple and the lava beneath it causing terrifying cracks to appear everywhere.

"Not without Aang!" Katara told him. Sokka was definitely staying with his sister. So, although every impulse Zuko had was screaming at him to get out before he died, he stayed. His honour demanded it.

Then suddenly, everything seemed to stop, the violently whirling smoke in the hall was sucked backward, momentarily obscuring Roku. When it had gone, so was Roku, leaving a dazed and weak-looking Aang in his place. They hurried to the boy's side, getting him up and running for the way out. The stairs down were already filled with liquid rock, and with the temple falling down around their ears, they had no choice but to try escaping through a hole that had appeared in one of the walls.

Just before they fell to their deaths, Appa appeared, trailed by Shuga. The male bison caught them on his back, quickly soaring off into the sky. Behind them the temple fell to pieces, while Aang told them about the comet and the rapidly approaching deadline Roku had told him of.


	7. Jet

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: Okay, I got lazy and created a flimsy excuse to effectively leave Zuko out of the episode, _mea culpa_. I really wouldn't have included Jet, but I don't know exactly how I'm doing what and where and when. So I didn't want to back myself into any corners come the second season and working Jet into the Ba Sing Se plotlines. I mean, how different would the show have been if they'd never met Jet back in his forest? Also, another drumroll please . . . sort of a moment you've all been waiting for.

* * *

Somehow, despite the sudden surge of urgency generated by the knowledge that Sozin's Comet was coming and the Fire Lord would take over the world if Aang didn't learn how to bend all four elements by then, no one seemed all that panicked. There had been a brief burst of activity, during which Katara had offered to teach Aang what she knew of waterbending, which was followed by shenanigans when she got jealous, stole a scroll from some pirates and nearly got them all killed.

Zuko found her, much later that night, standing by the water, trying and trying and trying again to get at least one move right from the scroll. "Stupid water! Work with me . . . Aarrgh!"

"Katara?" She whipped around, exclaimed in surprise, and sent the water falling everywhere. Zuko winced. "Sorry."

"What do you want, Lee?" she snapped. Then suddenly seemed to realise how irrational she was sounding. "I'm sorry. What's up?"

He took a few cautious steps closer. "I was a little worried. After you blew up at Aang before – not to mention stealing from those pirates – I just wanted to be sure you weren't . . ." he trailed off, not quite sure what word he wanted.

"I'm fine," she sighed. Then abruptly plonked herself down on the riverbank. "It's just . . . I showed Aang what I can do, and he's already better than me," Katara groused. "It's not fair. I worked for months to get that right, and he just . . ." she waved her hands, not even noticing when the water behind her followed her movements.

"Well, he _does_ have a teacher-"

She cut him off. "Don't tell me I'm a great teacher, Lee," she said. "Aang already told me that, and it doesn't help."

"It's not just that," Zuko said. "I mean, yes, you're showing him how to do things, and you didn't have that, but it's more than that."

Katara frowned. "What do you mean?"

Zuko started ticking points off on his fingers. "First, I'm pretty sure he's a prodigy. I mean, he's an air master, and he's twelve. He just naturally learns faster and better than other people."

"I hadn't thought of that . . ." Katara mused.

"Second, since he's already learned one kind of bending, I bet it's easier for him to learn another kind, because he's picked up things about bending, generally, from learning air," Zuko said. "It's like fighting with one kind of sword, then learning another. Not everything applies, but some things do." Katara was looking attentively at him now, clearly thinking about what he was saying. "Last, I don't know for sure, because I don't really know anything about the Avatar, but I'd bet that some part of him remembers his previous lives, when he had learned all this stuff already. So it's a little more like relearning something, than learning for the first time."

She pursed her lips briefly, in thought, then spoke. "I guess you're right. It's just . . . I worked so hard to teach myself all those things, and he just . . ." she waved her hands around again.

"Did them?" Zuko offered.

"What do you know about it?" Katara snapped.

He glared right back at her. "Excuse _me_, miss, 'I'm so strong in my element it follows me around when I'm not looking'," he snapped back, pointing to the whirlpools Katara had created just by absently moving her hands in her agitation. "What do _I_ know about staring at a bunch of kids half my age who can do all the bending I can and then some because I'm just so weak in my element I can't even do elementary things with it?" He glared at her. "At least you don't have your parents standing over you half the time telling you you're a disappointment just because you either are weaker than normal or can't bend at all."

That took the wind out of her sails. "What do you mean?" she asked with a confused frown, and moved closer.

"I mean, I couldn't tell my father I . . ." Zuko stopped before he accidentally said the wrong thing, then settled on the right lie. "I couldn't tell him I was an airbender, could I?" He looked away. "My younger sister's a firebending prodigy, and all I could do was fight with swords. As far as my father was concerned, I was failure twice over, because I couldn't firebend, and because I couldn't firebend as well as my prodigy sister."

Impulsively, Katara laid a hand over Zuko's and he stared at the gesture of comfort as though it were something alien. It actually was, but he kind of liked the way it felt. "Your mother-" Katara started.

"My mother was disappointed I wasn't a good enough bender, period," Zuko told her. "She thought it proved I have too much of my father in me." He looked out over the river. "She's probably right. People say I look like him."

"Is that a bad thing?" Katara asked.

"How . . ." He was going to ask her how she could say that, when he realised she didn't know anything about his father aside from the man being a firebender. Katara was still a decent enough person not to assume the worst of a person just because of that. So Zuko told her the one thing he knew would make sure she understood just what his father was, and just how badly he could turn out. "He gave me this," Zuko said, pointing to the scar on his face. "I spoke out against letting our . . . Letting Fire Nation troops get massacred, I was banished, and my father told me that pain and suffering would be my teacher. And then he just . . ." Zuko let the silence speak for itself.

Katara's eyes were filled with tears, and she reached out to him. "Lee."

"Don't," he said sharply. "I don't want pity. I just want you to understand that the Fire Nation is full of people like that." He stood, and then added. "That my _family_ is like that. That I might . . . that _I_ might turn out like that."

"You can't-" Zuko didn't stick around to find out what he couldn't do or be. He'd said too much, and he didn't want her pity. He almost ran back to his sleeping roll, and curled up in it, faking sleep. When Katara came back, he ignored her whispered query of whether he was awake. She crawled into her own roll and settled when it became clear he wasn't responding. Eventually, Zuko fell asleep.

The next morning, the four travellers were woken by the sound of startled screams and two bisons roaring. Zuko snapped awake and saw a company of Fire Nation soldiers scattered all over the clearing. Some had clearly been blasted aside with the powerful airbending of Appa and Shuga's tails, but others were rapidly approaching. Zuko cursed, fluidly rolled to his feet and sliced through a burst of fire with his swords, which he never slept without any more.

Katara had scrambled up and somehow the intensity of the moment gave her the impetus to perfect her water whip just when she needed it. Sokka had already engaged a soldier and Aang was zipping about the clearing, aiming air slices and tightly controlled whirlwinds at the attackers.

"Get the Avatar!" shouted one. "He's the airbender!"

Zuko immediately switched tactics. Even Aang couldn't take on a whole company by himself. "Hey!" he yelled. Switching his concentration, he threw out an open palm, pushing the heated air away from himself and into the shouting man. "How do you know it's not me?" A few judiciously placed kicks and air slices, and the soldiers were confused, dividing their time between the two of them.

Unfortunately, Zuko's concentration on both his bending and keeping some of the men distracted narrowed his focus, and he didn't see his attacker until too late. The ball of fire caught him in the back and sent him flying between the trees and out of sight of the rest of the melee. Dimly he heard Aang shouting at the soldiers that he was the Avatar, but he had no chance to return to the fight.

"Prince Zuko."

"Commander Zhao," Zuko replied.

That was the end of the formalities. No longer in a melee, having lost his blades, Zuko defended himself. Zhao had a solid stance, each of the flame fists he sent toward Zuko were solid and drove the teenager back a step. The man didn't let up, never giving the prince a chance to recover or counterattack.

That was until something he'd heard again and again from the airbenders he'd learnt from in the past came to mind. "A blow can't land if you are not there to receive it."

Zuko pushed aside his uncle's lessons on stance, on maintaining the root and on stability. This wasn't an Agni Kai. Zhao slammed a leg out, the kick flame strike flying through the air toward him, but Zuko didn't even try to block. He spun out of the way, leaping into the air, diving and rolling around. While Zhao spun around and around, trying to get a grip on the teenager, Zuko slipped around him easily, staying out of range by staying behind the commander.

It was enough to afford him the recovery time and to launch a counter-attack. Zuko whirled, dropping to the ground, fire lashing out from his extended right foot, knocking the man off-balance and sending him to the ground virtually on top of the prince. Zuko kept moving, rolling out of the way, using the momentum to turn his leap back to his feet into another strike with his trailing left hand. Zhao was flung back into the water, and Zuko levelled one final simple palm strike at him. The ball of flame caught the other man in the chest, and sent him flying across the water.

He didn't wait to see what had happened to Zhao. Zuko just ran back toward the others, fearing the worst, but instead saw them cleaning up the last of the soldiers. Zuko scooped up his swords from the ground, and with a wordless accord, the kids tossed everything onto the bison saddles and just flew.

Two days later, they were packing up camp again, when a couple trapped hog monkeys left them with the information that there were Fire Nation troops nearby. Katara and Aang had started to get into Appa's saddle, when Sokka stopped them. "Ah! No flying this time," he told the other two.

"What?" Katara asked.

"Why wouldn't we fly?" Aang added.

"Think about it," Sokka said. "How do you think Zhao knew where to find us? All he had to do was look for Appa and Shuga. They're just too noticeable."

Before Aang or Katara could protest, Zuko said regretfully. "Sokka's right. We should keep to the ground for a few days. Just long enough that Zhao, and any other Fire Nation soldiers he runs into, think that we've gotten away." At their confused looks, he explained, "Hopefully, Zhao will think we managed to sneak around him, and that we're several days flight away. Then we can start flying, and we'll have an extra head start because he'll be even further behind us than if we were just flying."

"Oh," Katara looked disappointed, as did Aang. They gathered their things, tossing them onto the bisons to carry, and set off walking. While Zuko walked, keeping Shuga company, and Aang was bounding around from tree to tree like his lemur, Sokka and Katara were arguing.

"Anyhow," Sokka was saying pompously, "My instincts are telling me we should play it safe and walk."

"Your instincts?" Katara said derisively.

Her brother shot her an annoyed look. "Yes," he told her snappishly. "Anyhow, you should listen because I'm the leader."

Zuko and Aang exchanged looks and promptly tuned into the argument. This was going to be either very stupid or very dramatic or both. No matter how you air sliced it, though, it was going to be entertaining. "You're the leader? But your voice still cracks!"

"I'm the oldest, and I'm a warrior," Sokka declared. Then he tried to deepen his voice. "So, I'm the leader!"

"First, Lee's probably older than you, and he's a warrior too. Second, if anyone's the leader, it's Aang. I mean, he is the Avatar," Katara reasoned.

Sokka stared at her, incredulous. "Are you kidding? He's just a goofy kid." The guy had a point, Zuko thought. Aang was hanging upside-down off of Appa's horns, having given up on his bouncing around.

"He's right," Zuko found himself saying along with Aang. Katara snorted and sent a glare their way that should have scorched the flesh from his bones. Zuko silently counted them all lucky Katara wasn't a firebender.

"Why do boys always think someone has to be the leader?" Katara demanded of the world at large. "I bet you wouldn't be so bossy if you kissed a girl," she added in a complete non sequitur. Zuko reaffirmed to himself that he wasn't going to get in the middle of this conversation. It was just too weird.

Sokka was sputtering like a broken ship engine. "I've kissed a girl," he said indignantly. "_You_ just haven't met her."

"Who? Gran-gran? I've met Gran-gran," Katara teased her brother.

"No, besides Gran-gran," groused Sokka. "Now you've been outvoted anyhow," he said irritably, "So either way why don't you just stop bugging me and walk."

"Who knows?" Aang piped up, "Walking might be fun."

"No, it won't," Zuko said with a sigh. "Sokka's right, but it won't be fun."

Sure enough, an hour later, Katara and Aang were whining and it was all Zuko could do to keep them from getting nasty with Sokka just because the younger two had sore feet. It did poor Sokka's credibility no good that they had managed to approach a Fire Nation camp from the direction the soldiers _hadn't_ come from, and before any sentinels had been set out for the evening.

"The Avatar!" one shouted, and a nasty-looking man sent a fistful of flame at them. He mostly missed, but he managed to set the woods behind them alight.

"Sloppy," muttered Zuko to himself.

Luckily no one heard him to wonder at the statement, because Sokka was trying to bluff their way out. It didn't so much work. Before anyone could make a move, however, there was an odd zipping sound and the firebender dropped like a stone.

"Nice work, Sokka, how'd you do that?" Aang asked.

Sokka looked as baffled as Zuko felt. "Uh . . . instinct?" he offered, clearly unwilling to give up his bluff.

"Look!" Katara shouted, pointing into the trees. A teenager, probably the same age as Zuko, leaped down, taking two soldiers down as he landed, then used some odd swords with hooks on the ends to send another two flying.

"Down you go!" he said with a smirk.

It seemed a signal for an attack to commence, and Zuko threw himself into the fray with a will. He wound up fighting back to back with their newest acquaintance for a moment. "Nice moves," said the other with an appreciative cocked eye as Zuko easily slipped through the forest of guan dao spears that had appeared, his two blades allowing him to easily slide past the defences of the polearms and take out the soldiers behind them.

Jet whipped his unusual swords about, catching the soldiers' weapons in the hooks, and disarming them with easy flicks of his wrists, even as he was able to cut and slash in between. "Nice move," Zuko shot back. There were no other benders besides the one man they had disarmed, so he didn't bother bending. He was armed, and there was something fundamentally unfair about fighting a non-bender with both weapons and bending.

It was kind of nice to be in a fight like this one, where he wasn't bending and there was no chance he'd be caught or killed or anything else. It wound down quickly, and soon enough, everyone was being introduced around, and Katara was staring at Jet with a sort of glazed and happy look in her eyes. Zuko rolled his eyes internally. He knew that look. He'd seen it directed at himself three years before.

It was before everything in his life had gone completely to pieces and he was still the Crown Prince of the Fire Nation. Azula's strange friend Mai had had that look. Zuko had mostly tried to avoid her, because being around her meant that he was around his sister. As much as he might have liked the adulation by _someone_ in his life, Azula's presence and all the teasing, harassment and mockery that went with it (not to mention all the 'accidents' she made sure he had while training) were just not worth it.

Their new friend Jet seemed to have no such trouble. Zuko had to admit, Katara had acquitted herself fairly well in the melee, and she was fairly pretty. Actually, very pretty, he admitted in the back of his mind. So the flirtatious smiles Jet was sending Katara's way were entirely explicable. Sokka was unhappy about it, but anyone who knew Sokka knew that the boy thought Katara should be living in a nunnery, with her only male company being Sokka and whatever item of clothing he needed mended that day.

Suddenly, the youngest of the so-called Freedom Fighters, the Duke, said, "Hey, Jet! These barrels are full of blasting jelly."

"That's a great score," Jet told him with a smile.

The large one, Pipsqueak, his age entirely undiscernable from the combination of size and apparent stupidity, held up a crate and said, "And these are full of jelly candy!"

Jet's face never wavered as he said easily, "Also good. Let's not get those mixed up." He reminded Zuko a little of his Uncle Iroh when the man had to deal with some of his dimmer subordinates. Jet's band started loading up a cart and with enthusiastic endorsement from Katara, they were soon all heading for the Fighters' hideout.

Zuko had to admit, it was an impressive treehouse. It was nothing on the complex system of tunnels and openings of the volcanic islands the airbenders in the Fire Nation had called home, with the doors and camouflage controlled by airbending. But, this was built by a bunch of kids, not over a century by hundreds of airbenders.

Down on the ground, Shuga was making some noises that Zuko thought were kind of suspicious. He hurried down and saw exactly what he'd been worried about. "No! Absolutely not! I am not going to deal with bison calves while I'm helping the Avatar save the world. Do you understand me?" Appa, who had been nuzzling at Shuga in a distinctly amorous fashion, gave him a disgruntled look.

"Lee?" Aang's voice drifted down from the canopy. "What's going on?"

"Appa's trying to get Shuga in calf, that's what," Zuko said irritably. "Maybe one of them will listen to you." He turned to Shuga and said sternly, "I know you like Appa. He's a good bison. I just don't want to lose you while I'm still travelling with Aang."

Aang dropped out of the trees. Somehow, he knew what Zuko was actually saying. "Even if something happens and Shuga has to stay somewhere to be safe, we're your friends, Lee. Me and Sokka and Katara. We won't leave you behind."

Zuko turned and let his pride take the hit as he didn't bluster, trying to say that he wasn't afraid of being alone. "Thanks Aang."

"So . . . I offered you some lessons in airbending. Would you like one now?" Aang asked.

He smiled. "I'd really like that."

"Great!" Aang said. "So . . . um . . . all airbending derives ultimately from the motions of the air currents around us. So what you have to do is start by getting a good feel for the way that air curls and moves around things. When I move my hand through the air, it displaces the air, and it forms eddies around my hand."

Thinking for a moment, Zuko said, "Like when you move your hand through still water?"

Aang nodded. "Whatever helps you feel it." He thought for a moment, and said, "So when you breathe, you can feel the movement of the air in and out of you. That's really important. It's the easiest way to feel the air, is by feeling it as it enters your nose or mouth, travels down your throat and into your lungs."

Zuko frowned, and decided to see what he _could _feel of air. Hae had said some thing about how the elements connected, and maybe, Zuko would be able to sense the other elements through the presence of his own in them. For a moment it didn't seem to work, and then suddenly, the air he'd inhaled was . . . infused with the heat of his inner flame. Concentrating, Zuko could feel the way the heat moved in the air, and when he exhaled, he was able to trace the swirling, curving, circular movements of the air until the heat dissipated. He smiled.

The rest of the lesson with Aang was hard work. It was obvious the younger boy had never taught anyone before, but he was very patient and willing to show something as many times as were needed, and was also willing to try explaining something differently until Zuko was able to understand.

By the end of the lesson, several of the moves that had left Zuko baffled before, tornadoes and some interesting blocks an airbender could use, were suddenly within his reach. A little more practice and he'd be able to do them. Aang smiled and told him he'd done well, and Zuko felt a heady rush. It was just nice to be given praise and to not hear somewhere behind those words of praise someone thinking about Azula or the other airbending children.

He had even found himself able, with Aang's coaching on how to feel air, to reduce the amount of heat in the air and still have the same impact, or to increase the heat in the air to give himself a greater impact.

They companionably headed off to dinner with Jet's band of kids. That was when things got a little strange. Aang was quickly pulled away from Zuko, and Zuko found himself isolated at the back of the room with no one talking to him. Katara was making big moony eyes at Jet, so Zuko knew he wouldn't get any help there. Sokka was also hanging around Jet, but he was constantly glaring at the other teen, and Zuko sighed, putting the display down to Sokka's overprotective tendencies.

Aang was soon busy with the Duke, eagerly talking about something or other. Most of the words Zuko caught were the names of big, exotic animals. He tuned out of that conversation because he knew Aang was just finding someone who was interested in the same things he was. The real problem was that none of Jet's bunch were willing to even talk with him. They seemed almost to only be tolerating him, which was odd, because they'd all been perfectly friendly with him before.

It was more of the same the next morning, and Zuko wasn't even able to ask anyone where his friends were, the forest-dwelling gang was so determined to shun him. So, he headed off to meditate, and then went to spend time with Shuga and Appa. When he got there, they were getting dangerously close again. Zuko, feeling like someone's five-year-old child who doesn't want a younger sibling (and not much liking the experience) decided he was going to have to watch them. And then he took a brief break, left for a quick bath in a nearby stream, and when he came back, Shuga was edgy and Appa was missing.

Zuko went looking for the others, and found Katara and Aang standing on a cliff, overlooking a dam. He heard Katara say, "Why would they need blasting jelly?"

"Because Jet's gonna blow up the dam," Aang replied, sounding like he'd just come to a realisation.

"What? No," Katara denied instantly. "Jet wouldn't do that." She didn't sound quite as certain as her words though, and Zuko winced. He started to leave the woods, when he saw Jet sneaking up on the pair.

Aang didn't try to argue with Katara. He just said, "I've got to stop him." He started heading for the cliff's edge, clearly planning to take the glider to the dam.

"Jet wouldn't do that," Katara said, now pleading.

Before Aang could take to the air, Jet had leapt out of the brush, and used his swords to catch Aang's glider and take it away from him. "Yes, I would," Jet said.

Zuko didn't know everything that was going on or why destroying the dam was such a problem, he wished he'd put more effort into talking with the others since they'd met Jet, but he knew Katara and Aang were concerned enough about it to want to stop it. "Shuga!" he shouted, calling his bison out to them.

"Lee!" Katara said, startled. Then she turned back to Jet, "Why would you destroy a whole village of people?"

Jet's looked at Katara earnestly, "Katara, you would too if you just stopped to think. Think about what the Fire Nation did to your mother – we can't let them do that to anyone else, ever again."

"So you're going to flood a whole village?" Zuko asked, incredulous. "There are children down there!"

Aang was concerned with more important things. "I need to get down there," he said, reaching for his glider. Jet lashed out with his swords and yanked the staff away from him again.

Shuga chose that moment to show up, and Zuko moved to block Jet, who lunged at the Avatar. "Take Shuga and deal with the dam!" he shouted at the other two. Then he was too consumed with ducking, weaving and generally trying not to allow Jet to gut him. He noted with relief that Katara and Aang had hopped onto his bison and were already heading for the dam, but Jet chose that moment to cleverly twist a hand, causing Zuko to lose his grip on the blade in his right hand.

"I should have known _you'd_ convince them to save that Fire Nation scum down there," Jet snarled.

Zuko glared back at him, as they wove back and forth in the clifftop clearing. "What does that mean?" he shot back. He ducked under a swing of Jet's sword, made a feint to the right and dove for his other blade. He almost made it, too.

"It means Katara told me all about your sob story," Jet said. "Fire Nation nobility, and then you got yourself banished. So you're not only Fire Nation scum, you're faithless Fire Nation scum." He smirked, kicking Zuko's blade close to the cliff edge.

"It doesn't matter at all to you that there are people down there who've never done anything to hurt anyone?" Zuko demanded.

Jet glared back. "They're Fire Nation. They've done it just by _existing_. Like you."

"You told your friends to shun me, didn't you?" Zuko asked. Just to confirm a suspicion.

Face set, Jet told him, "Yes. I don't want them associating with Fire Nation scum. Not you, not those . . ." Jet was clearly searching for a word vile enough to describe the settlers in the valley.

"They're people, Jet. Mostly just innocent people who've been told this is open land for settlement and don't know any better." Zuko tried to get through to him. "Not many people in the Fire Nation know what's really going on out here. They don't know. They can't. No one tells them."

The so-called Freedom Fighter was having none of it. "They should _know_. How can they not know?" The question was rhetorical, because he renewed his attack, clearly not interested in the answer, and Zuko didn't have the breath to spare to explain about propaganda and the lies the Fire Lord told.

In the distance, there was an explosion, and they both paused in their fight, Jet's expression exultant, Zuko's horrified. But the dam didn't so much as twitch, and as they looked, smoke started to rise a small distance away from the structure. Zuko grinned, and he murmured, "They did it," with relief.

Jet's face went from delight, to shock to unadulterated fury in seconds. "No!" He turned to Zuko, clearly intent on taking out his fury over his balked plans out of the other's hide. They ranged back and forth, Zuko managing to get Jet to lose one of his hooked swords, so they were both working with half a set. Then Zuko stumbled on a stone, Jet got in a lucky strike that sent Zuko stumbling back, accidentally kicking his own fallen blade over the edge of the cliff.

If the swords hadn't been so important to him, if they'd been just another set of weapons, Zuko wouldn't have done it. If it hadn't been such a sore point with him all the things his own family had done to the world, he wouldn't have done it. If he hadn't spent the last day being shunned on Jet's orders he wouldn't have done it. It was one thing too many, though, and Zuko whipped around, the form of his roundhouse kick perfect, and sent an arc of fire into the other teen.

It slammed into his opponent with all the force of a runaway komodo rhino, sending Jet flying backwards into a tree trunk. He slumped to the ground, unconscious, and Zuko hurried to the cliff's edge, hoping he could at least see where the blade had fallen so he could retrieve it. He didn't have to.

"So, were you trying to kill me?" Sokka asked, good-humouredly, as he flew up from below on Appa. He handed Zuko the blade, pointing to the spot on the saddle where it had managed to land by sheer luck.

Zuko took back his sword, and with great relief, slotted the two back together and into place on his back again. "No. I was trying to keep Jet occupied so Katara and Aang could stop the dam from blowing up."

Sokka stopped, whipped around, and saw the apparently intact dam, and the smoke coming from a small distance away from it and he whooped in triumph. "Yes! I got the town evacuated, but I'd hoped we could still stop it."

"We almost didn't," Zuko said, wryly. "But Aang figured it out in time, and I sent them to stop it on Shuga." He went and collected Aang's staff, then started to climb onto Appa. "We should g-"

He was cut off as Jet, who had woken up, unnoticed, had crossed the clearing with amazing speed and had yanked Zuko back, sending him flying across the clearing himself. "You stinking, lying . . .!" Words seemed to have failed Jet in his fury over Zuko's duplicity. The Fire Nation native knew what had so angered Jet. As long as Zuko was just a nonbender, or an airbender who had lived in the Fire Nation, he was just bad. But a firebender was The Enemy and everything wrong with the world.

Jet, inspired by sheer fury was swinging at Zuko again and again, intent on killing him. Zuko wasn't even able to get at the swords on his back because he needed both his hands free to catch himself as he ducked, wove, flipped and rolled out of the other's way. They were interrupted by a completely unexpected source, as a sudden blast of water caught Jet completely by surprise, and sent him flying back into a tree.

Zuko stopped, and saw Katara, tears in her eyes as she manipulated the water to coat Jet, and then breathed out, an icy wind escaping her lips that made Zuko think of his Uncle's breath of fire trick, only reversed. He watched as ice appeared, and quickly grew to coat Jet until he was frozen to the trunk of the tree.

"Katara!" he shouted. "We could have freed this valley! And now you're defending that fire scum?" He glared at Zuko. "He's a-"

Jet never got to say anything else, because Katara slapped a gag made of ice over his mouth. "No Jet," she said. "You're the one who's been scum. Goodbye Jet." She turned her back on him, leading the way to the bisons. As they climbed on, she told them softly so Jet couldn't hear, "We're going to have to keep the villagers out of the village a while longer. We still need to repair the dam. We weren't quite in time, and we shouldn't take risks. Aang's managed to earthbend a little by accident, so he's holding the gap closed, but we should get going."

Since Katara and Shuga seemed to be having some sort of odd girl to girl bison bonding moment, Zuko climbed onto Appa with Sokka. "Thanks. I mean, you could have told Katara about me, but you didn't."

"Told her what?" Sokka asked.

"Thanks," Zuko said.

Sokka stared. "No, really, what? I have no idea what you're talking about. This isn't an I'm-saying-what-because-I'm-letting-you-know-I'll-pretend-I-didn't-see-anything-what. It's a 'What?' what."

"What do you mean, what-what?" Zuko snapped. "My firebending."

"_What!_" Sokka said, whipping around and staring at Zuko.

He couldn't believe he'd just done that. "I . . . thought . . . you'd seen me bend Jet into the tree," Zuko told him, slowly. "And then you were saying 'what' and I guess I thought you'd figured it out. Before, I mean. So that you didn't think it was a big deal or something." He backed away a little, then looked at Katara as she sat grimly on Shuga's head, saying something to the bison. "I'll . . ." He felt like crying, this was so awful.

"You'll what?" Sokka asked, his voice sounding odd. Zuko couldn't look up to see the expression on his former friend's face.

He took in a shaking breath. "I'll take Shuga and go as soon as we land. I . . . Well, that doesn't matter. You wouldn't believe me anyhow."

"Lee," Sokka said, "Just . . . why didn't you say anything? Why all the pretending?"

Zuko turned back, furious. "Why? My mother really _is_ an airbender. I grew up having to pretend I was an airbender. I learned to fake it well enough that they just thought I was incompetent. I was 'Lee the crappy airbender' half the time." He glared at Sokka. "Would you have trusted a firebender? Would anyone? _I_ don't even trust me."

"Was your bending the only lie?" Sokka asked. They were getting close to the dam.

Zuko sighed. "There's another one," he admitted. "But . . . I . . . that one changes _everything_. And I don't know if I'm ready to stop being Lee yet." He turned to Sokka. "But it doesn't really matter, because I'm-"

"It has to do with why Shyu knew you, and you knew Zhao, doesn't it?" Sokka asked shrewdly.

"Yes." It came out as almost a whisper.

Sokka looked at him as they landed, then grabbed Zuko's arm before he could get off the bison. "You're going to have to admit it to Aang and Katara eventually, you know," he said. "But I'll keep it quiet for now."

"What?" Zuko gasped. He'd been preparing to get on Shuga and get out of there before Katara or Aang crippled him for his lies.

"You're our friend," Sokka said. "You've never done anything to indicate that we shouldn't trust you, and so far, all I've seen are secrets you were keeping because you were scared how we'd react." Zuko could feel his mouth hanging so far open, he was sure he ought to be feeling the saddle under his chin. "Now come on," Sokka said. "Let's see what needs doing for the dam."

Zuko followed him, dazed but feeling something like joy bubbling in his chest. Sokka knew and he hadn't rejected him. He'd always thought friends like that were something that only happened in stories and to people like the Avatar. He pinched himself to be sure he wasn't dreaming. "Ow."

"Are you okay?" Katara asked him, concerned.

Zuko grinned at her happily. "I'm great. I was just pinching myself."

He heard her mutter to Shuga. "Boys are so _weird_." Life was good.


	8. Black Spirit

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: I . . . just love watching Zuko ninja, okay? This isn't really necessary, plotwise, so I did some character development, took a break before doing Zuko's next big thing, and ninja is _so_ a verb. It is if I say it is. And I love watching Zuko ninja. If I were ten years younger . . . actually, it'd still be statutory, but it'd be less so. Now that I've said waaaaay to much, on with the show.

* * *

Zuko looked over to where Katara sat on Appa, next to her brother. Aang was poking around in the temple they'd taken shelter in, but he had a sinking feeling the Avatar wasn't going to find much to help with nursing Sokka.

It had been an eventful week. After helping the village rebuild their dam, the four friends had left, continuing their journey north. They'd passed by the massive canyon known as the Great Divide, stopping to help out two tribes of refugees get to the other side. That had been a headache, and Zuko considered that he might be very lucky to have been banished, since he'd never have to mediate between two feuding groups like that if he never became Fire Lord.

The day after that, they'd stopped in a small fishing village and Sokka had volunteered the two of them to work on a fishing boat in a storm. Whenever it was that Sokka was better, Zuko was going to beat his friend black and blue for making him go through that.

If Sokka got better.

The day before, his friend had just had a hacking cough, but overnight, it had turned first into a fever, then into a fitful, tossing, sleep. Now his best friend was lying in his sleeping bag, a fever so high, Zuko would have thought Sokka was a firebender if he wasn't so sick, and hallucinating. It was the hallucinations that gave Zuko the heart palpitations, because there was nothing anyone could do to ease them. Katara was constantly trying to cool Sokka down, because his fever was running so high, but there wasn't much she could do.

Zuko paced, feeling helpless. Shuga rumbled at him, something that was less comforting than usual because it sparked that frightening hysterical laughter from Sokka. Still, he went to his bison and leaned against her for comfort. He tried to ignore the exchange between Katara and Sokka.

Aang emerged from the back of the temple, asking, "How's Sokka doing?"

"Not so good. Being out in that storm really did a number on him," Katara said as she bended the damp cloth cool again. "We're just lucky it didn't do the same to Lee."

"Yeah," Zuko muttered. "Lucky."

"Stop it," Katara snapped at him. "It's not your fault Sokka's sick, and he told me about you saved him from falling in the water during the storm. So it's because of you Sokka's alive for us to worry about at all."

Aang looked between them, and decided to just continue. "I couldn't find any ginger root for the tea, but I found a map." He unrolled it on the floor, and Zuko leaned over his shoulder. It was a map of the island they were on. "There's an herbalist institute on the top of that mountain. We could probably find a cure for Sokka there," Aang said.

Katara mournfully told him, "Aang, he's in no condition to travel." Then she seemed to stiffen her spine, and told them, "Sokka just needs more rest. I'm sure he'll be better by tomorrow." And then she did something that made Zuko's heart sink. She started coughing.

"Not you too," Aang said, sounding a little exasperated and a lot worried. Zuko echoed the thought in his own mind.

Katara rolled her eyes. "Relax. It was just a little cough. I'm fine." She fixed them both with a look meant to drive home the point. It might have if she hadn't burst into deep hacking coughs and finished by looking like something had just sucked the energy right out of her. Aang flinched away and Zuko felt his hands flex as he desperately wanted to _do_ something to help.

"That's how Sokka started yesterday," Aang told her. "Now look at him! He thinks he's an earthbender." Zuko flinched at the nonsense coming from Sokka's mouth. "Lee? Are you okay?" Aang asked.

He looked up and smiled, tightly. "I'm fine. I'm just . . . worried." _Scared. Terrified. _

Aang looked back at Katara and said, "A few more hours and you'll be talking nonsense too. I'm going to find some medicine." He was about to launch into the air on his glider, when the cloudy sky was split by lightening, followed by a crack of thunder. "Uh . . . maybe it'll be safer to go on foot," he said, closing up the glider and putting it aside. "Lee? You'll keep an eye on them, right?"

"Of course," Zuko told him. "Be careful. We're in Fire Nation territory, you know."

Aang smiled and waved. "I will. See you soon." Then the boy leapt into the air, once, twice, then he was running, his airbending speeding him along, leaving a trail of dust behind him.

Katara started to say something, then began coughing again. Zuko hopped onto Appa and pulled down her sleeping bag. "Here," he told her. "Why don't you get settled now, before you start feeling too sick to move. I'll do whatever you need me to do, okay?"

"I'll be okay," she assured him, clearing her throat. "I'm sure Aang will be back soon with some icky tea for us to drink or something." Zuko just stood there, lips slightly pursed, staring at her. "I don't need to go to bed," she insisted. He kept staring. There was a long pause, and then she said, "Fine. But I'm only going because I'm not feeling well, not because you told me to."

"Fine," Zuko said agreeably. "So do you want me to get a fire started?"

Katara sighed from where she was getting herself settled in her sleeping bag. "That would be nice, thanks."

A few minutes later, Zuko was grumbling as he tried to get the spark rocks to work. He'd been avoiding this particular task the whole time he'd been travelling with the Avatar. He was a firebender, so he'd never had to learn how to start a fire without his bending. As long as the others were well, he'd been able to find any number of other things to do around the camp site.

Katara giggled, coughed and then giggled again. "I never thought I'd see this," she told him.

"See what?" he asked her sourly.

"See the so-competent Lee be unable to get a fire started," Katara told him smugly. "Do you need me to come out there and help?"

He glared over his shoulder at her, then turned so that she couldn't see the rocks, clacked them together one last time, then leaned forward pretending to blow gently on the supposedly alit tinder. A quick burst of flame from between his lips had the tinder actually alight and catching onto the branches he'd collected. "No, I don't need any help," he told her, showing her the now-lit fire.

Katara wriggled down a little further in her sleeping bag and said, "So you and Sokka have been spending an awful lot of time talking. What do you talk about with my brother? Meat? Girls?"

"A bit about both," Zuko admitted. "We talk about you and my sisters sometimes." He shot her a quick grin. "About how younger sisters can be a really big pain."

"Pfft. Like older brothers are so much better," Katara said.

Sokka spoke up, "Hah! Take that boulder firebender!" he flopped around in his sleeping bag a bit, then subsided. The moment took away all the ease Zuko had begun to feel and threw him right back into his fear of losing a friend.

"You're really worried about him," Katara observed.

"Why aren't you?" Zuko shot back. "He's so devoted to looking after you and you're just-"

Katara sat up, "Just hold on a minute. Who said I wasn't worried? I'm worried, but he and I have both had worse. When Sokka was six he got so sick one time that he pretty much just lay there, looking like he was dead for a week. He got better after that. I'm not as worried as I could be because I can put it all into perspective." She sent Zuko a firm look. "And as for looking after someone, ask him sometime who cooks for him and does his laundry and mends his clothes and makes sure he doesn't try to live off nothing but meat and makes sure he doesn't forget our spark rocks and-"

"Okay, okay!" Zuko said, holding up a hand and laughing a little. "You're right about that." He sighed and sat on the floor and leaned on Appa next to Katara. "I just . . . I never had a friend like him before. I don't want to lose that." Shuga rumbled from where she had been grooming Appa's neck fur.

Katara smiled. "Shuga seems to feel a little left out."

"Oh," Zuko shot his bison a look. "Like you even noticed what with all your flirting," he told her. She deliberately got up, turned her back on him and settled down again. He sighed, climbed up onto her back and sprawled out, using both hands to simultaneously scratch at the two spots over her shoulder blades that made her do the rumbling purr a bison did when it was particularly content. Moments after he started, she abruptly flopped down, spread-eagled, and Zuko murmured to her, "You know I love you, Shuga."

When his arms finally got tired, he crawled off her, hugged the part of her neck he could reach, and then let her lick him. He turned back to Katara, who had an odd look on her face. He raised an eyebrow at her, and at his wordless query, she smiled and said, "You're just so sweet."

"Sweet?" Zuko asked as he started getting all the bison spit off himself.

"Yes, sweet," she said definitely. "You're so stern and forbidding a lot of the time, and then you'll be such a . . . a goof with Sokka." Katara sent an affectionate look at her brother before turning back to him. "Then I see you with Shuga, and it's like you're this whole other person with her."

He raised an eyebrow again. "In a good way?"

"In a good way," confirmed the waterbender. "I just sort of . . ." she flushed and trailed off.

"Sort of what?" Zuko asked, suspiciously. She was embarassed by something. She didn't have a crush on him did she?

Katara said it, almost defiantly. "When you get like that with Shuga, I just want to cuddle you."

He was about to reply, but then he said, "Clearly you're starting to have Sokka's delusions."

It was almost as though, now that the die was cast, she was going to see it through. "I mean, you just look like a little boy with his stuffed tiger-seal toy," she told him. "When you start in with Shuga like that, I can't help but want to pat you on the head and hug you."

Zuko looked at her in a sort of horror. "You sound like you want to mother me," he said, eyes wide.

"So what if I do?" Katara demanded. "You look like you need it, and I do it for Sokka and Aang all the time. Not to mention the kids in the tribe back home."

Clearly she was suffering some sort of illness-related loosening of the tongue, Zuko decided. He changed the subject rather sharply. "So I was thinking about the trouble you'd been having with getting the moves on the scroll," he said.

"Wha-?" Katara was caught unawares by the lightning-fast change of topic.

Zuko ignored her confusion and bulled on with the topic. "Maybe you need to try working on the moves first, just practicing them until they're second nature before trying to move the water. That way you're not concentrating on both the bending and being fluid, because you already have the body moves down."

"That's a good idea," Katara said, contemplatively. "I mean, when I was teaching myself, I was always just trying to get the water to do what I wanted it to. But it should do that better if I have the movements, so . . . next time I'm trying a new move I'll do that."

Sokka spoke up then. "Katara . . . please . . . water."

Katara held up the waterskin, and frowned. It was empty. "Here," Zuko told her. "I'll go see what I can find. If nothing else, it's raining out and I should be able to collect some."

"Thanks," Katara told him.

He went outside, musing to himself about Katara's apparent impulse to . . . cuddle . . . him. On the one hand, it was mortifying, since he was too old to want 'cuddling'. On the other hand, it was kind of gratifying to know that she felt the same affection for him as for Aang and Sokka. The thought of her hugging him wasn't unappealing either.

Back when his mother had still lived at the palace, one of the things he'd loved most had been when they'd be around servants or his uncle, and she'd pull him close, kiss the top of his head and let him hug her back. He'd often pretended in those moments that she cared about him as much as the older sister she so often compared him to. He'd just close his eyes and let himself think for a moment that someone other than Shuga loved him.

Zuko was so lost in contemplation, that when he got back from the well he'd found, full waterskin in hand, that he just stood there while Katara dribbled water into Sokka's mouth. So he was taken completely by surprise when she grabbed his arm, yanked hard, and sent him falling almost on top of her, where she'd crawled halfway out of her sleeping bag. "Katara? What are-?"

"Shush," she told him as she manoeuvred him until his head was tucked under her chin and he was sprawled half on and half off her. "I'm cuddling you."

"Katara-"

"Quiet. I want a stuffed tiger seal and you're my best option," she told him. "And since I know you want one too, we'll be each other's tiger seals."

"That is quite possibly the weirdest thing anyone has ever said to me," Zuko told her. "And I'm including Sokka's recent stint in that."

"The dancing meat hats need to be basted, your meatliness," Sokka put in.

Zuko blinked. "Okay, that _was_ weirder."

"Hmph," Katara mumbled, and dragged Zuko's arms into place around her. It was oddly comfortable, and she was clearly not letting go, so Zuko stayed put. It was actually kind of like the time he'd skinned his knee and Lu Ten had found him and held him while it was getting cleaned and bandaged. Of course, Katara was a girl and didn't feel anything like Lu Ten, particularly where his head was resting, but that wasn't important.

What was important was that he felt content in a way he had never felt with anyone except when he was much younger and sleeping hidden in the abandoned stable near the palace where Shuga would sneak in to visit him. She'd been too small to carry him anywhere then, but she'd made an excellent bed for a lonely child. Using Katara as a combination of pillow and stuffed toy was having the same effect, and Zuko drifted off to sleep in spite of himself.

He wasn't sure how much later it was that he woke, but his eyes snapped open with a sound that was familiar, but he couldn't immediately place. Then it sounded again, and Zuko disentangled himself from Katara, hastening to where they'd put their packs. "Lee?" he heard Katara's sleepy voice enquire.

The horns sounded again, this time, clearly moving along the relay. "You hear that?" he asked her.

"Yes," Katara said, yawning. "What are they?"

"Message horns," Zuko said tensely. "It means that something specific is being watched for, and someone saw it. It happens when . . . oh . . . there's an escaped prisoner," he explained. "There are sentries all over and they're provided with horns. If they see him, they're supposed to sound the horn to let people know the prisoner is nearby."

Katara frowned, but she seemed to catch on. "You're worried it's about Aang?"

"I don't want to go," Zuko said, "But I have to see what it's about. Is there anything I can get you before I go?"

Katara thought, quickly, and told him. "Just fill the waterskin back up, and stoke the fire a little. We'll be okay for a bit."

"I'll try to hurry back," Zuko told her as he hurried to do as she asked. "Just . . . if it _is_ about Aang . . ." he trailed off, not sure what to say.

"Just go," Katara told him. "Hopefully this isn't anything important to us." She smiled a little wryly. "As soon as you come back, I expect my stuffed tiger seal back. You're better at it than Sokka and Aang."

In spite of his worry about everything, Aang, Sokka and Katara, Zuko chuckled. "I'll be your tiger seal any time you want," he said. Then violently blushed as he realised how that sounded. "I'm going before I say anything else stupid."

He'd spotted an outpost nearby, and with the rain was able to cover most of himself with a heavy hooded cloak without suspicion. It wasn't the most complicated plan he'd come up with to get information, but in this case, simple was probably best. He marched up to the door of the outpost and banged on it. "Hey! Can you give a traveller shelter for a bit?"

There was thumping and clattering inside before the door finally opened onto an incredibly poorly kept single-room outpost. The guards inside were ill-kempt, and Zuko could hardly blame their commanding officer for sticking them out in the backwoods of nowhere. It kept them out of sight and meant no one had to try overseeing slobs like this. "Whaddaya want?" the one at the door asked.

"Just to get out of the rain for a bit," Zuko told them. "Dry out my boots before I have to get going again."

The man looked down his nose at Zuko, then sighed and let him in. "Damn weather. Why things couldn't even out a little so we get this rain over the whole year instead of having monsoon season, I don't know." Zuko looked around, and noticed the hearth was practically a puddle, and the fire was out. The whole room was so damp it felt freezing cold. The soldier caught Zuko's look and said, "The storm came up so fast we didn't have a chance to close off the water trap in the chimney. None of us are firebenders, so we're just stuck until things dry out."

As a calculated risk, Zuko told him, "Then I guess you're in luck." Before they could ask why, he went to the fireplace, and with a few quick bursts of bending had the spot dried and a merry fire burning in the hearth. He turned around and saw something he hadn't even realised he'd missed until then. The smiling faces of people who appreciated his firebending.

"Spirits! You're a lucky break," the soldier who'd opened the door said with a sudden smile. "Take a seat. What were you doing out in all that anyhow?"

Zuko carefully settled onto a chest against the wall. "I'm from Rouzin, and my sister's wedding to that idiot merchant of hers is in a few days in Muqan," he said, naming two nearby towns.

"It'll take you a few days to get to Muqan," said the other soldier.

"I know," said the teen with a wry smile. "But this way I can avoid staying at her betrothed's house." He made a face. "He likes Noh operas."

"So?" asked the first one. "By the way, my name's Han, this is Rishu."

"Lee," Zuko said, nodding. "So, it's a problem because he likes to sing them. Especially the female parts." He gagged. "My sister thinks it's cute."

The two soldiers stared. "He does know those are for eunuchs, right?" Rishu inquired.

"_I_ think there are things he's not telling her," Zuko said.

"Ah," the two men chorused, with understanding looks. The moment was interrupted by the horns sounding again, and Han grumpily got up, went to the door and blew two blasts of the horn out of it then tramped back to his chair. "Lousy Avatar," he muttered.

"Avatar?" Zuko said, startled. He hadn't quite been expecting that.

"Yeah," said Han. He held out a sheet to Zuko. On it was a description of Aang, a statement that he was travelling with three companions, none of which was described, two sky bisons and a list of attributes Aang's airbending gave him. "Look at that," he said in disgust. "The Avatar can create tornados and run faster than the wind. That's silly Fire Lord propaganda."

Zuko shrugged. "Maybe they don't want people to underestimate him. So that's what everyone's relaying right now?"

"Orders from Commander Zhao," said Rishu glumly. "I heard he called in the Yu Yan archers."

Zuko's head snapped up. "Aren't they under General Shinu's authority?"

"They are," said Han. Then he paused. "How'd you know that?"

"I've got a cousin who was discharged for snooping in his commander's office," Zuko told them. "I think he was sent off somewhere in disgrace, but not before he told everything he'd found to anyone who'd listen. Mostly about how many turkey-ducks were distributed to each division. He'd been convinced his was getting shortchanged or something."

"Yeah, my brother did that once too," confided Han. "He didn't get caught, though."

Zuko was getting worried though, because the horns meant that warnings were out and people had spotted Aang. He was about to say his farewells, despite the rain, and run back to the temple to get Shuga and start looking. That was when the door banged open and two men, still wearing their face paint marched in with never a by-your-leave. "So," one said with a smirk. "Looks like the common man is pretty cozy."

Han, Rishu and Zuko exchanged looks. Yu Yan archers were the elite, and they had the pay and attitudes to prove it. But there was little that could be done, since they outranked the rank and file by a great deal. You certainly couldn't ask them to get their muddy feet off the table, or not offer them the only seats in the outpost. Zuko moved to the floor, allowing Han and Rishu to take the chest. They smiled at him, and Rishu asked casually, "What brings the great Yu Yan to our little outpost?"

"Ah!" said the first Yu Yan with a self-satisfied grin. "We're on our way to Rouzin. After all that time in the rain, slogging around, we finally captured the Avatar. Little bastard was fast, but not as fast as a Yu Yan arrow."

"You killed him?" Zuko asked, horrified.

"Nah," said the other, dismissively. "Just shot up those poofy clothes of his until he was pinned, then carted him off to Shinu's prison tower." He leaned back in the chair with a satisfied smile. "We didn't want to wait for the sake shipment that's due in a few hours and wind up drinking in that dismal place, so we're taking a little leave to see if there's some decent ale and pretty girls in town."

Zuko glanced outside, and seeing that the rain had cleared, told Han and Rishu, "Looks like it's cleared up enough for me to get going again. Thanks for the shelter."

The two soldiers smiled and followed him outside, "Thanks for the excuse not to be in there with those two for a few minutes," Rishu told him with a grin.

"Thanks for the fire," Han said, sincerely. "Good luck with your sister and all."

He nodded and waved and hurried off down the path that would take him toward the main road. A few minutes later, once he was sure he was out of sight, he broke into a run, hurrying to find a good clearing for what he needed to do. A few minutes of hasty bending and he had a large pile of charcoal. Carefully stripping out of his clothes, Zuko soaked them in a stream, using them to carry water back to the blackened leaves and sticks. It was the work of only a few minutes to make a black paste, drench his clothes thoroughly with it and then dry them out again.

Redressed in his now black clothing, Zuko hastily pasted the last of the charcoal and water onto his face, blacking it out and hopefully concealing his identity. Then he hurried out to hide and wait by the road for the sake shipment and his ticket into Shinu's prison fortress.

It was a very long wait, and Zuko was starting to think he should have gone back to see Katara before coming out. However, the longer he waited, the more likely it was the shipment would come by while he was gone. When it finally passed him, the sun was almost completely set, and the darkness hid Zuko's movements as he slipped quickly from the bushes by the roadside and got under the wagon, clinging to the crossbeams below.

A ride that felt very long later, so long his hands started to cramp, they were paused outside the gates. Zuko watched the feet of the guards and saw one, accompanied by torchlight, approach the wagon. He must have either been holding one or bending a fire from his hand. The man went to the back of the wagon and paused, clearly inspecting the shipment. Then he circled around the wagon, pausing at each side. He stopped, then the feet moved closer, and the firelight started to move lower. Zuko silently cursed in his head and scrambled for the far side of the wagon, praying the whole time that there was no one there to catch the black figure crawling under the tarp and into the wagon bed.

He got lucky. A moment later the soldier declared them clear for the last time and Zuko ducked low behind the barrels of sake to avoid detection. Peeking out from a rip in the canvas, he noted with some dismay that there were three curtain walls to get past on the way out.

Eventually the wagon rumbled to a halt, and Zuko was able to steal out of it, having untied the barrels, planning to use the rope that had lashed them into place in the escape. He quickly sprinted through the grates under the fortress, glad that the prisons tended to have the same layout one from another. He'd visited one once, when he was a child, and this was laid out fairly similarly.

In the background, he heard Zhao posturing. Going on about Sozin's comet, the honour of the Fire Nation and all the other propaganda Zuko had grown up with. The propaganda all those so-enthusiastic soldiers had grown up with. He could hear the cheers of the men, disciplined, as Fire Nation troops were trained to be, even in their enthusiasm. The roars of triumph made him feel cold as he thought of the people he'd met over the years in the Earth Kingdom, wiped out like the Nomads had been a century before. He shook his head, trying to focus. Now wasn't the time. What he was doing was part of preventing that fate.

Zuko went toward the high security cells, and lurked about in doorways and needed every bit of gymnastic skill and stealth he had to avoid detection. Finally, however, he was able to catch a conversation between off-duty guards. "Can you believe that? Four guards for one ten-year-old kid."

"Yeah," said the other. "I mean, sure, he's the Avatar, but they've got him tied up in there and why do we all need to be pulling double shifts just because of him?"

The two men continued down the hall, complaining about having to guard the Avatar, but it took Zuko a very short time to locate the only cell with four guards stationed in front of it. It was an even shorter time for him to take them out, one by one, until there was only the one guard left. He spun around the corner before the last guard could sound the alarm, throwing the knife he'd taken off the first guard to knock the alarm horn from the man's hand, and using the bucket of water left by a lazy caretaker to put out the last guard's attempted firebending, then spinning around, with the same motion used to bring the bucket around and knock him out.

Zuko absently noted the frogs crawling around on the floor, then put it down to some new game the soldiers had made up. Bored out of their skulls, Fire Nation soldiers had been known to race maggots, set up rat fighting rings, and he'd even once seen the men betting on who made the prettiest woman as they attempted to trick other units while cross-dressing. So seeing half-frozen frogs just meant someone had a new game lined up.

When he cracked open the door, Zuko saw Aang, tied up, his arms and legs spread so that even the most minimal bending was out of the question. He took his twinned blades out, twirling them a few times to warm up a little and get some momentum to make the cuts clean when he got Aang free.

Aang froze, his eyes wide, and then he clearly started panicking. A small, mischievous part of Zuko couldn't help himself. It was a stupid practical joke, but he couldn't think of any other time he was going to get to scare the living daylights out of the Avatar like this, and he did a modified kata all the way to where Aang was, trying not to snicker as the boy's eyes bulged and he screamed.

Two quick slashes and the ropes holding Aang's arms were cut, two more and his legs were free. Then he carefully judged his distances, and did away with the leather cuffs themselves.

"Who are you? What's going on? Are you here to rescue me?" Aang asked, in quick succession.

Zuko grinned at him under his charcoal. "Did you think Katara, Sokka and I would just leave you here?" he asked.

"Lee?"

"C'mon," said Zuko. _One, two, three . . ._

"You did that on purpose, didn't you?" Aang muttered as he followed.

Zuko snickered. "You should have seen your face," he told Aang.

He'd started to lead the Avatar out of there, when suddenly Aang stopped and rushed off in another direction. _What the hell?_ "My frogs! Come back! And stop thawing out!" Aang was scooping the half-thawed frogs up and trying to stuff them into his shirt.

"I really don't want to know," Zuko told him as he grabbed Aang by the scruff of the neck and started towing him away.

Aang looked at him anxiously, "But the herbalist said Sokka and Katara need to suck on them!"

"The . . . I still don't want to know," Zuko informed him. "Look. We're escaping right now. We'll get more frogs on the way back. Do you really think those frogs will still be frozen by the time we get to Katara and Sokka again anyhow?"

"I . . . I guess not," Aang said. "But shouldn't we pick them up? I mean, won't people think it's weird?"

"This from the guy who just said his friends need to suck on frogs," Zuko muttered back as they slipped around corners and into the grated holding area for the dirty refuse water. "Anyhow, people will just think someone's thought up a new thing to bet on. Racing half-frozen frogs may become the new craze in the area." He pulled himself up to check on the surrounding area. "Okay, we need to head for that corner," he said, pointing. "We'll go up the rope. There are three curtain walls to get past before we're out, so be quiet and stealthy, okay?"

"Okay," Aang whispered back.

They hurried across the space and had almost scaled the wall when the alarm went up. The next few minutes were a crazy mess of fighting and airbending on Aang's part. They'd almost made it over the last wall, but Zuko just couldn't keep his grip, and they both fell back to the ground. Aang kept them both shielded from the collective fury of so many firebenders as they were cornered against the gate and ten benders fired on them at once.

Zhao's voice shot out over the din of the raging flames. "Hold your fire! The Avatar must be captured alive!"

Praying that no one could see his face behind the charcoal at this close range, Zuko reacted instantly, pulling Aang against him and sliding both swords under the boy's chin, positioned to slit his throat. "Pretend I'm actually threatening you," Zuko murmured, and glared at Zhao, letting his actions and silence to the Commander speak for him.

A moment later, Zhao was letting them out, clearly unwilling to risk the Avatar dying at the hands of whatever thug he believed Zuko to be. He was slowly backing them away, wanting to get out of range before turning to run. He'd forgotten the Yu Yan archers.

He woke up, some time later, his head aching, lying on his back somewhere in the woods. "You're awake!" Aang said, sounding relieved. "I was worried when that arrow hit you in the head."

Zuko slowly sat up, feeling the world spin a little, then settle back down. "Oh. How did I forget the Yu Yan?"

"The who?"

"The archers. They're the elite," he explained to Aang. Then he pulled himself up. "We'd better get going. You said the herbalist said Katara and Sokka need to suck on frogs?"

"Yeah," Aang told him as they started walking. "She said they secrete something that will make them better. After she finished feeding her stupid cat," groused Aang.

"Her cat?" Zuko asked, feeling bewildered.

Aang told him his story, which lasted all the way down to the swamp, where they collected the frogs. Then Zuko sent Aang on ahead. "I have to wash as much of this out as possible," he told the Avatar. "And I can't move fast enough to keep up with you while you get the frogs to the others before they thaw. Just . . . let me know how things go with the frogs?"

"You mean all the faces Sokka's going to make?" Aang asked.

"Exactly," Zuko smirked.

Aang shot him a look. "I'm going to get you for that stunt with the swords, you know," he told Zuko.

"Right," said Zuko, suddenly feeling a little worried. What could Aang think of for pranking revenge, especially with his bending? "Umm . . . I'm sorry?"

"You're not gonna see it coming," Aang promised, before zipping off with his frogs, leaving Zuko to get as much of the black out of his clothes as possible, and contemplating both avoiding the inevitable, and getting a good sneaky suit for if he had to do this again.

It took quite a while to get back, and by then, Shuga gave him very disapproving looks for having been gone so long, leaving her with two delusional teenagers, both of whom had spit frogs on her. Zuko sighed and resigned himself to an evening of lying splayed out on her back, scratching her shoulders.

It was all a very unsatisfactory end to the whole adventure, until Katara insisted on climbing up and joining him. She took the left shoulder and he took the right, while Sokka dozed, having been left where he was, and Aang sprawled out on Appa's tail, quickly falling asleep. When they were finished, the waterbender insisted that Zuko had to be her 'stuffed tiger seal' again, and burrowed into him.

Zuko decided it was quite satisfactory after all.


	9. Firebender

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: So last time was the second time some of you may have noticed the chapter title changing. That's because I'm planning to keep one chapter ahead in posting. That means that I have just finished the chapter after the current one when the current updat goes up. That's twice now that I've absentmindedly put up the title for the last chapter I worked on, rather than the chapter I was actually posting. So now you know. Also, I live in fear of making Zuko or the others into a bunch of canon-Sues. Let me know if it happens, okay?

* * *

The past couple days had been positively insane. First there was the old guy who believed so much in a fortune-teller that he hadn't even flinched from a raging platypus bear. Then there was the entire village of people who based their whole lives on what that fortune-teller said. Sokka was the only person who had anything close to a rational perspective on things, and he'd been driven so crazy by all the irrational people in the village that the best conversationalist Zuko had for most of that time was Momo.

Katara had been particularly disturbing in her quest to badger exact details of her future out of Aunt Wu until the poor beleaguered crackpot had barricaded herself in her home to avoid the waterbender. Not that Zuko blamed the older woman – Katara had been downright frighteningly obsessed with her need to know who her future husband was.

He'd started avoiding her too, when she began asking him to help her figure out the powerful bender that she'd eventually marry.

Zuko was just grateful that 'Lee' was a terrible airbender. At least she wasn't going to attack him with the misplaced determination that _he_ was her future husband.

After all the madness and the predictions, the town was about to get destroyed by a volcano because the people were so determined to believe in Aunt Wu that they weren't going to check the volcano. And if the ditch he'd been helping to dig worked, they'd probably put this down to Aunt Wu again, the way the crazy man with the bear had.

He heard Sokka shout suddenly, "Dig faster! Dig faster!" Glancing up, he saw that the volcano had erupted. Zuko redoubled his efforts, just trying to get a little more height on the far wall and a little more depth in the trench.

Aang's voice was raised suddenly over the din of furious digging and earthbending. "Everyone needs to evacuate! We'll come for you when it's safe!"

Sprinting for the wall, Zuko ran up it, managing to vault up to the top unassisted, and joined Katara, Sokka and Aang in watching the lava pour down the mountain, destroying everything in its path. For a moment, it seemed to be working. The molten rock stopped before it hit the village and started pouring off into the river, sending up enormous clouds of steam into the air. Everything smelled of ash and sulphur and the heat was incredible. In spite of the horror he was seeing, Zuko felt energised by the heat, just as he had under Roku's temple. He could feel the fire that was in the stone, which had melted it. Right now, it was just like when he infused air with his inner flame to let him fake his airbending.

Katara's voice pulled him from his musings. "It's too much! It's gonna overflow!" Sure enough, the lava was moving too fast and it wasn't diverting to the river quick enough. The level was rising to the edge of their dam fast.

An explosion rocked the countryside, and the volcano sent another surge of lava and a burst of pyroclastic debris into the air. A boulder landed in the lava and sent it flying. While Katara and Sokka turned to run, Zuko reached into himself and reacted force for force as he felt the wave of liquid fire pour toward him.

He'd been watching Katara and Aang waterbend for a while, now. He'd wondered before if he could bend lava like water. His stance shifted, he moved his arms and body in concert, not with the staccatto movements of firebending, but the smooth glide of waterbending, and _bent_ the fire in the stone up into a wave.

The heat was incredible, but it only made him feel more like he was immersed in the fire that was the core of his self. A smooth whirling of his hands and it was being diverted, sped toward the river. It was the most amazing feeling he'd ever had – like he was immersed in the very essence of firebending.

Still, he was overheating. It was a risk a firebender took on when manipulating fire outside himself in large quantities. It was why no firebender would ever try to stop a forest fire. Their inner fire would rise to meet the outer one and burn the bender from the inside-out. In an effort to relieve the strain, Zuko tilted his head back and used that old trick his uncle had been nicknamed for, the breath of fire. He'd begged to be taught the trick as a child, and now, with his hands occupied and his inner fire rising to meet the lava flow he was directing, Zuko took a deep breath and as he exhaled, allowed the fire to pour out with his breath in a jet that was large enough to use as a signal fire.

Finally the flow slowed enough that he could let it go. The euphoria faded as his grasp on the fiery stone was released. He turned, and saw Aang staring at him. The look on the Avatar's face made Zuko's heart sink like a stone. When he saw Katara's face, that sinking feeling turned into a chill that drove off the last of the joy of his bending and left nothing but exhaustion and apprehension.

He looked over at Sokka and was a little relieved that Sokka didn't look at all foreboding, just kind of gobsmacked over the scale of what Zuko had just done.

"Lee?" Aang said, hesitantly.

Zuko turned back to him. "Yes, Aang?"

The younger boy looked at him, hard, and said, "You're not an airbender. Are you?"

"No," Zuko replied. "I'm not." What else was there to say?

Katara and Sokka were suddenly both up there, Katara demanding, "What was that? How did you do that? That wasn't airbending and you were breathing fire! Only a firebender could do that. How did you manage to bend air _and_ fire and the lava? Aang's the Avatar! What-"

Sokka cut her off as Zuko suddenly wobbled. He'd bent a huge amount of what was, in effect, fire-infused rock. He was exhausted, and all the digging and the sleepless night and the worry that he was about to lost his place as a friend of the Avatar combined to make him feel rather faint. "Not now, Katara. Lee? Hang on, let's get you somewhere to lie down. That was some pretty powerful bending there." Sokka looped one of Zuko's arms over his shoulder and helped him down the path to Aunt Wu's house, where Zuko gratefully collapsed onto a pile of cushions.

"So . . ." Sokka said after a moment. "Not quite how I would have recommended you let Aang and Katara know about the firebending thing, but you don't really have the best track record of picking good times."

Zuko looked away. "I know, I know. I just . . . it never felt like the right time, and then I could _feel_ the fire in the lava and I knew I could bend it . . ." he trailed off, shrugging.

"So that's how you did it," Aang's voice said from the doorway. They turned to see the other two members of their party had joined them. "You heated the air and put fire into it. You weren't _air_bending, you were bending fire _in_ the air." He came over, and did that floating into a seat on the floor thing that still baffled Zuko. "Why didn't you say anything?"

"It's hard to explain-"

Katara cut him off, snapping. "You'd better try. We all trusted you, and you've been lying this whole time about being a firebender." Something occurred to her. "Why aren't you mad, Sokka?"

"Lee told me," he said, easily.

"And you didn't tell _us_?" Katara demanded incredulously. "And why _Sokka_?" she added.

Before Sokka could take any sort of fall on Zuko's behalf, Zuko put in, "No, I used a fire kick on Jet when I was fighting him, and I thought Sokka had seen. So I acted like he already knew, and told him by accident."

"That still doesn't explain why _Sokka_ didn't tell us," she said.

Sokka shot his younger sister a look. "Because he asked me to let him tell you on his own. If I'd known he'd put it off until he did something stupid, I'd've told you."

Aang cut through the incipient fight, and asked, "Just . . . explain why you didn't just tell me you were a firebender to begin with," he said. "One of my best friends was a firebender." His expression got a little misty. "Kuzon and I, we got into so much trouble together."

"I didn't think you'd trust a firebender," Zuko admitted. "I mean, no one trusts firebenders except other people from the Fire Nation."

"With good reason," Katara grumbled.

"Very good reason," Zuko agreed. "The Fire Nation wiped out most of my mother's people and drove them all into hiding. Even now, there's a general policy so that most airbenders are taught to believe that their own enclave is the only one left. There are a few people higher up in an enclave that know otherwise – my mother was one of them, which is how I know – but the airbenders now all live in isolated pockets across the other three nations. I can find the signs that there's an enclave nearby, but I don't actually know where any of them are." He sighed. "But that's not the point. The point is, the Fire Nation has done everything it can to harass and destroy the other nations. I'm ashamed to be my father's son."

"But when we knew you better-" Aang started.

Zuko shook his head. "Look what just happened. Neither you or Katara trust me any more. And it's all because I didn't tell you the truth. When was I supposed to tell you?"

"Right after you told me?" Sokka asked dryly.

"I wasn't going to tell _you_ either!" Zuko snapped. "I was going to let you all think I was an airbender so you'd all continue to trust me."

"Well, now we can't trust you at all, because you've been lying to us this whole time!" Katara shouted.

Zuko paled, and stepped back. "If that's how you really feel, I should go," he said softly. "I know better than to stay where I'm not wanted."

Sokka started to say something, but Zuko didn't want to hear it. He didn't want to hear anyone tell him that he was a horrible liar and deserved whatever he got. He didn't want to see the betrayed look in Katara's eyes or the confusion in Aang's. If he didn't stay for the rejection, he didn't have to feel the pain from it. So he was on his feet and out the door before anyone could say anything else. What was important now, was getting away from the others before he could hear someone reject him from their life again.

Ignoring Sokka's shouts to come back and talk to them, Zuko vaulted onto Shuga, tossing down the collection of Sokka and Katara's things that had taken up residence on her saddle and set her flying. She was in the air without resistance, and Zuko said, "It looks like I messed up again, Shuga. They'll never want me back. Not after I lied like that."

She rumbled questioningly at him.

"They found out I'm a firebender," he told her. "Katara was just so . . . angry."

Shuga flew away for hours, eventually landing at the seaside. Zuko had deliberately turned Shuga South so that Aang and the others would be forced to leave him behind. He didn't want to slow them down if they decided to go after him, and making sure that they wouldn't seemed the best choice.

He slid off her, unclipped her saddle, and pulled out her brushes. As long as he kept moving, kept working and kept distracted he wouldn't have to think about the fact that he wasn't going to get more airbending lessons from Aang, he wasn't going to hang out with Sokka again and talk about how annoying little sisters are and he was never going to be Katara's stuffed tiger-seal again.

Instead, he focussed on brushing every bit of Shuga's fur until it was gleaming in the moonlight and pretended that he wasn't lonely. he set up camp, made a fire, put up a tent and laid out his bedroll. He did all the chores he could think of, but eventually there was nothing left to do. He sat beside the fire, staring blankly into the light, trying not to think of the looks on the others' faces. "At least they didn't _say_ it," he said. "At least I . . ." he trailed off. He wasn't sure what would be worse. Knowing they'd been thinking he was a stinking liar and a firebender, but never hearing the words, or at least hearing the words so that he could accept it. Some small part of him kept insisting that they hadn't actually said it, which meant that maybe they didn't believe it.

Shuga had snuck up on him, and licked him. He turned and wrapped his arms around as much of her neck as he could, burying his head in her fur. It felt like he was eight years old again, and the other kids had been taunting him for being just barely a bender, only a million times worse. "At least you won't leave me," he said to his bison. He felt more than heard her reassuring rumble.

That night he didn't climb into his tent, preferring to sleep on Shuga's tail. That way she was right there, and he wasn't alone.

Zuko woke up that morning to a sharp snap of pain on his face, but other than his eyes snapping open, found himself unable to move an inch. He heard Shuga snarl and shift under him, but a couple of odd noises and she suddenly collapsed. "Wha-?" he mumbled, confused.

A woman with long black hair, dressed all in leather with spiral tattoos on her bare shoulders leaned over him. "Huh. Not much to look at, but I suppose a thief wouldn't want to be," she commented.

"What?" Zuko asked again. He hated that feeling when something was going on and he had no idea what.

The woman shrugged. "Some Fire Nation captain wanted you hunted down. Said you stole something from him. I don't know," she told him. "All I want is my bounty."

Footsteps crunched over the sand, and Zhao spoke, "I am quite impressed bounty hunter. Now," Zuko heard him approach, and suddenly Zhao's ugly mug was inches from his face. "Where is that Avatar Prince Zuko?"

"Wait, wait, wait," the woman said. "You said I was finding you a thief. Now you've said he's a prince. Which is it? Because my rates for finding lost royalty are a lot different that the ones for thieves." He voice became hard. "And you haven't even paid me for the first, either."

Enough movement had returned to Zuko's head that he was able to follow the arc as Zhao tossed the woman a bag of what looked like coins. She opened it, poured it out and tested each coin individually. "Not bad," she said.

"You have your money wench, now leave," Zhao demanded.

She smirked. "Tou-_chy_. Good luck with your prince then," she told him. "He looks pretty obstinate." Zuko was able to watch her as she vaulted onto the back of a strange furry creature with a weird tentacled pink nose, brown fur and big claws on its feet. She turned it around with a tug on its reins, cracked a whip and went galloping off.

"Now, your highness," sneered Commander Zhao, "Let's try this again. Where is the Avatar?"

"I don't know," Zuko told him. "We parted ways."

Zhao looked at him sceptically. "That I find difficult to believe unless . . ." He tapped a finger thoughtfully against his lips as he put on a patently false contemplative expression. "Unless your little friends found out who you are."

He wasn't quite able to hide the wince and cursed himself for it.

"So that's it. They found out who you are and they threw you away like trash." Zhao grinned at him. "So much for friendship," he told the teenager. "So since you've been betrayed by your little friends, how about you betray them back, now?"

Zuko glared. "Even if they did turn on me, I still wouldn't hand anyone over to _you_, Zhao," Zuko told him. "I wouldn't give you the satisfaction. Then again, I wouldn't hand _anyone_ over to an elephant rat like you, in any event."

The man's face darkened in anger, and his fist lashed out and backhanded Zuko. Without any control of his muscles, Zuko couldn't brace himself for the hit or anything else. He felt his lip split open and his head rang with the force of the blow. Then Zhao seemed to get ahold of himself. "Take him and the animal onto the ship," he ordered someone standing outside of Zuko's limited sightlines.

In response to the command, several soldiers came along and picked Zuko up, and roped Shuga up, dragging her across the sand. They pulled both onto the vessel by sheer brute force, then tied Shuga down onto the deck. Zuko was dragged inside and down to a cell in the hold. He managed to start getting the feeling back just in time for them to toss him in, careless of where and how he landed. He hissed in pain as he felt the sharp edge of the metal pallet on the wall cut into his shoulder, and felt the gentle slip of blood starting to make its way down his back.

"If you change your mind, let me know," Zhao called to him. "I'll be by . . . tomorrow perhaps, to check on you."

Zuko just lay there, trying to breathe through the pain. Finally, however, he was able to move again, and he quickly pushed away before the edge managed to saw its way through to the bone. For a while, he just focussed on pushing away the pain and trying to figure out what he was going to do. He had to get out of there, he had to get Shuga out of there. Whatever his former friends thought of him now, they might well come to rescue him out of a sense of duty. It was his duty to prevent that from happening.

So, he had to get the shackles off, get out of his cell, get to Shuga, cut her loose and then fly them both out of there.

Item the first then. The shackles. He couldn't burn them off. They were metal, and by the time he'd heated them enough to melt them off, he would have burned his own hands off. That was counterproductive. Maybe he could pick the locks? Not likely. There wasn't anything in the cell with him he could use for that.

His answer came as he twisted his hands around, trying to figure out if there were any weak points for him to exploit. There were two kinds of shackles used in the Fire Nation. The first were metal bands with a hinge that had a lock to hold them closed. They were much heavier than the second kind and much more expensive to make. They were also more secure, because the other kind had a flaw. The second kind were spring-locked. That is, the bands were like tense springs. They held themselves closed strongly enough that no human could pry them open with his bare hands. They were opened by a wedging mechanism that would pry them open just enough to work the hands out. The flaw was that anything sharp, a knife or other thin metal surface could be used to get them open. They were cheaper to make, however, so a lot of places simply took the risk since they'd never let their prisoners have access to knives anyhow.

It seemed Zhao had chosen the inexpensive route. He'd also left Zuko in a room with a sharp edge at an angle he might be able to use to get the bands off. Unable to stand because of how tightly his feet were bound as well, Zuko got to his knees and crawled to the same bunk that had cut his shoulder open. A few moments and momentary alarms as the guards outside shuffled about, worrying him that he was going to be caught, and Zuko's hands were free.

Getting his feet loose was a lot harder, but he managed in the end, and crept to the cell door, listening carefully. He was startled when he heard someone start to unlock the door, and scrambled back, quickly taking a position that hopefully looked like he was still restrained. The door opened wide, and Zuko saw a man carrying a tray of what looked like scummy water and moldy bread.

The exiled prince didn't think, he just acted. Lunging forward, he grabbed the metal tray and yanked it up, catching the man on the chin and sending the 'food' flying. He continued the motion, spinning the makeshift weapon around to get the man in the temple, knocking him out, and sending a flame fist at the other guard in the hall. For good measure, Zuko aimed a kick at the first man's head to make sure he stayed down, grabbed the other, still-stunned, guard and rammed his head into the wall twice and then tossed him into the cell with the first, shutting the door and them into the cell.

Then he took off down the hall. He didn't quite know which direction he should be taking, but he made an educated guess based on memory and hurried down the hall, repeatedly ducking into empty rooms and cells to avoid detection. He'd try to fight his way out if he had to, but he preferred to put that off as long as possible. One of his brief hiding spots made him send a rare thanks to whatever higher powers liked him. Zhao had tossed all of Zuko's things into the storeroom, and that included his dao blades. He didn't have the time or ability to carry too much, but his blades, his rucksack and some straps to secure himself to Shuga's back were simple enough to carry.

He slipped out again, hurrying down the hall, but this time his luck seemed to run out just as he got within sight of the door to the deck. "Zhao," he said, faced with the man who had rubbed him the wrong way ever since he'd first seen him as a child.

"Prince Zuko," the other replied. "I really must try not to underestimate you quite so much," he said with a condescending smile. "Why, you almost escaped." The man sent a wave of fire down the corridor. Zuko couldn't help but marvel at his ruthlessness. A move like that in such confined space was deadly to anyone who wasn't able to get completely out of the way or come up with some kind of block. Screams from Zhao's own men as their commander cooked them alive in his eagerness to deal with the prince rang in the enclosed space.

Zuko responded, not with fire, but with his false airbending. When the fire faded, Zhao was alone in the corridor, looking smug, everything between him and a small series of arcs etched into the floor, ceiling and walls was blackened. Zhao's smug look faded as he saw Zuko, completely unscathed still standing.

There was no better moment, and Zuko took advantage of Zhao's shock to run across the still-burning-hot floor, elbow the man aside and race up to the deck where Shuga was bellowing her anger at being tied down. Luckily for them both, there weren't chains long enough on the ship to tie her down, and Zuko was able to easily slice away the ropes, hop onto Shuga's head and fly off into the night.


	10. The Deserter

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: It`s been a while, I hope everyone enjoys the new chapter. I also want to thank everyone who`s favourited this, and the Proposal Series, and everyone who's added the story, or me, to their alerts.

* * *

In the end, they just picked a direction and flew, and when they landed, it wasn't with particular care. Zuko was tired from being captured, from bloodloss from the wound in his shoulder and from clinging to Shuga's back. Shuga was tired from struggling the whole time she was captured and having to fly more carefully than usual to avoid bucking Zuko off.

Which was why neither noticed any of the signs that there was an encampment of some kind nearby, and why they both pretty much curled up together and fell asleep moments after landing, despite Zuko's still sluggishly bleeding shoulder and the uncomfortable positions they were both in.

"Hey. Hey!" Zuko woke to the shouted words and someone poking him.

A half-second to recall he wasn't with the Avatar's little group any more and another half to recall where he _was_, roughly, and Zuko snapped awake, lurching away from the person who'd been standing beside Shuga, using a long stick to prod Zuko where the firebender was sleeping on his bison's back. Unthinking, Zuko snapped a hand out and set fire to the stick. The man's eyes went wide, and then he said, "Oh! You're a firebender! Who are you? What's that animal? Why are you here?"

"I'm here because I was banished," he said bluntly. "Who are you?"

"Banished? Really?" said the man. "Wow. I just deserted."

Zuko sighed. "Huh," he said unencouragingly. His shoulder was starting to hurt really terribly, and all he wanted to do was get it bandaged and go back to sleep. "Is there a doctor or a herbalist around somewhere I could visit?" he asked.

"Well-" the man started, but was unable to finish. He was interrupted by a dozen men, armed to the teeth with spears and wearing unusual straw helmets and armour.

"Who are you?" demanded the man in the lead.

"I'm Chey," responded Zuko's newest acquaintance. "You know my name already, Lin Yi."

The man's expression somehow became grimmer than it already was. "Not you," he snapped. "I meant the boy."

That was a little much. "I'll thank you not to call me 'boy'," Zuko snapped back. "I'm sixteen. Not a child." Shuga rumbled from behind him and started to settle into the posture that meant she was about to start bending the men away. "You might want to aim those spears somewhere else," Zuko told them, trying not to show how much pain he was in. "Shuga gets cranky when people threaten me."

Lin Yi just smirked. "Well, she can be as cranky as she wants, but you're coming with us."

Giving in to the inevitable, Zuko just sighed. "As long as someone's willing to look at my shoulder, right now I don't even care."

That seemed to take the man a little aback, not that Zuko blamed him. He would have tried to get away if he'd been well enough to, but right now he was outnumbered and too hurt and tired to put up a serious fight. They trundled through the woods, finally reaching what looked much like a soldiers' camp. He was thrust into a tent and found himself face to face with an unexpected person. "The Deserter!"

"The Banished Prince," Jeong Jeong replied mockingly.

Zuko's eyes narrowed in irritation, but he supposed the other had the right. He'd started it, after all. "General Jeong Jeong. It is an honour to meet you," Zuko said, bowing and placing a fist on his chest as was the custom. Then he hissed. The movement had stretched the slowly scabbing wound on his shoulder.

The man frowned, then asked, "What brings you to our camp, your highness?" That mocking edge remained, and Zuko, not one for people playing games lost his temper a little.

"Your men, apparently. I was doing nothing but sleeping on my bison when that man, Chey, woke me. I had simply asked where there was a doctor or herbalist nearby so I could get my wound bound, and I find myself dragged before you." He glared. "I make one error in rudeness due to my surprise at seeing the elusive man known as The Deserter, and now I am to suffer constant mockery for it?"

Jeong Jeong just looked at him, saying, "You are impatient."

Rolling his eyes, Zuko told the man, "You are playing games. I didn't ask to come here, I was dragged. I didn't ask to speak with you, I was forced. If you're expecting me to beg you for help or some other favour, I have no intention of it. Either let me go, help me or at least tell me what you want. Stop playing games."

"A reasonable request, I suppose," Jeong Joeng told him. "Allow me to help. There are a few things we need to discuss, in any event. General Iroh has been quite worried about you," he said as he stood and started helping Zuko out of his shirt.

Zuko was a little dismayed when his voice cracked, belying the calm facade he wanted to present. "Has he?"

"Yes," Jeong Jeong said, his tone of voice a rebuke. "He searched for you for two years before finally admitting you had vanished into the Earth Kingdom."

"Do . . ." Zuko hissed as a cloth gently sponged the injury. "Do you communicate often?"

The man didn't answer, and Zuko was aware of a close examination of the cut. "This is quite deep. Unfortunately we do not have a practiced healer here to stitch it closed, and it may become infected if we simply bind it. Not to mention the scarring."

"I can take another scar," Zuko started indignantly.

Jeong Jeong came around to face him. "Perhaps your pride can, but this is in a bad place. If it scars too severely, you may find yourself with the mobility of the arm limited."

"Oh." His eyes went wide. He hadn't even thought of that. "Then what am I going to do?"

Jeong Jeong gave him a narrow-eyed look. "If you are willing, I can cauterize the wound."

"That won't leave less scarring," Zuko told him. "Whether with firebending or something else."

"I have long found firebending to be the most despicable of elements," Jeong Joeng told him. "I hate the way that, unlike water or earth, it is only good for destruction."

Zuko nodded in agreement. "I know what you mean. Even when you're just lighting a campfire, a wrong move could hurt you in a way that the simplest moves of earth, water or air can't."

His lips slowly curving into a smile, Jeong Jeong said, "You cannot know how surprised I am, Zuko, to hear such words from one so young. You would be much wiser than many of my pupils." He shook his head, "But that is not what I was going to discuss. I have sought ways to create constructive uses for fire, and this is one I developed on the battlefield."

He held up a single finger, and as Zuko watched, a needle-fine point of fire emerged. "You developed a better cautery technique," Zuko said, awed at the fine control being demonstrated. "That's . . . amazing."

"If you would consent?" Jeong Jeong asked, putting out the flame.

Zuko nodded. "Yes. Thank you."

Soon, Zuko found himself with the cut closed, his shoulder bandaged, and dozing from a dose of poppy to take the worst of the pain. He was vaguely aware of being moved to a tent, and Shuga following, even insistently sticking her head through the tent flap once the men had left. With her big head a comforting sight, Zuko slept.

He woke the next morning to Jeong Jeong sitting next to him while Shuga snored away, having parked herself in front of the tent. "Good morning," he said. "Now that you have been healed to the best of my resources, I would like an answer to why you were travelling near my camp, and how you came by a sky bison."

"I was near your camp because that's where Shuga and I wound up after escaping from Zhao's ship," Zuko told him honestly. Everything he'd heard about the man suggested he was honourable and his defection from the Fire Nation over its excesses spoke even more strongly of that. Also, Katara's question, _Do we have any reason not to trust him?_ echoed in his mind. "He wanted me to tell him where the Avatar was."

"The Avatar?" Jeong Jeong said sharply. "You were travelling with him? Is that how you gained the sky bison?"

"Shuga's origins aren't my secret to tell," Zuko said. After all, trusting Jeong Jeong with himself was one thing. He'd sworn never to reveal the secrets of the airbenders to the Fire Nation however, and the Deserter was too close to that for comfort. "Anyhow, we parted ways before that, and Zhao was under the mistaken impression that I knew the Avatar's location."

Jeong Jeong shook his head, sadly. "My old pupil was always impulsive. He had no desire to learn restraint. He was too concerned with forcing others to his desires."

"I know," Zuko said. "He burned his own men to get to me. I was lucky to have picked up some tricks from the Avatar."

"Tricks?" The Deserter's voice was sharp again. "What has he taught you of firebending?"

"Nothing," Zuko said. "He hasn't even learned waterbending yet, only air." He grinned. "But there are still things to be learned from other bending styles," he said. A flick of the wrist, and a ball of spinning air, much like Aang's air scooter was hovering above Zuko's palm.

"How . . .?" asked the man. He didn't look so much baffled as eager.

Zuko shrugged. "Probably just a matter of focus. Like your pinpoint cautery." He flushed. "It's a little less impressive when I remember that I still haven't actually mastered fire, just . . ." He trailed off, not certain of how to express the thought.

"You are not out of control, as a child is," Jeong Jeong said. He thought for a moment, then said, "I once swore I would take on no more pupils, but I wish to learn these 'tricks' from you." He smiled slightly. "An exchange, then? Your 'tricks' for my teaching?"

It was something Zuko had always wanted. Someone who would teach him fire, without referring to Azula and perhaps even think he was a good student.

The time that followed – only a few weeks, but still – was one of the best times Zuko had ever had. He had been introduced around the camp as Jeong Jeong's nephew Lee, who had been burned and banished for taking his uncle's part in too public a way. The men there accepted him as someone's family and part of the larger family of expatriate Fire Nation citizens. Jeong Jeong trained him in firebending, giving him lessons in the advanced techniques he'd envied Azula for having mastered, and in exchange, he showed the other man his counterfeit airbending.

That airbending had done more for his firebending than he'd realised. The intense focus it took to infuse heat into the air and move it, or to use the energy created by his firebending without creating anything more than the barest hint of fire, had honed his control. It was, perhaps, the proudest day of his life when he was told by the Deserter, "You have been my best student. I am glad I had the chance to teach you, your Highness."

He was assigned chores, and had to work, but he'd been doing that alone and with Aang, Katara and Sokka since he'd run from his uncle's ship. This time he had camaraderie and no need to hide who he was. For the most part, anyhow.

News reached them of the Avatar's arrival in the area, and Zuko silently vowed to make absolutely certain not to let himself or Shuga be seen. He was therefore happy when Jeong Jeong gave the men the order not to bring the Avatar anywhere near them.

Chey, who had turned out to be a genuinely good-natured idiot, therefore managed to get them all within shouting distance of the camp, told them everything, and Zuko hid himself and Shuga, her in a nearby valley and him watching from a place in the trees, as his former friends were brought into camp. He watched as Aang tried to get in to see Jeong Jeong, was told he wasn't getting in, and Chey get taken into the man's lean-to, no doubt for a chewing out he would hopefully not forget.

For the rest of the evening, Zuko made himself scarce around camp, avoiding seeing or being seen by the three. He had just curled up for the night, when Jeong Jeong approached him. "I should warn you," he said, a little grimly, "That I have agreed, against my better judgment, to teach the Avatar firebending."

Zuko sat bolt upright. "What? Why? Aang's a nice kid, but he doesn't have the temperament for firebending. Not yet, anyhow."

Jeong Jeong sighed. "As we spoke, I had a vision of Avatar Roku demand that I teach the Avatar's next incarnation. What else was I to do?"

"Huh," Zuko said.

The man smiled. "You must be tired. Normally you attempt greater wit than that." Zuko gave him a sour look. The man who had been letting Zuko call him 'uncle' said, "I came here because you must decide now whether to make amends with your former companions or hide and remain here." He placed a fatherly hand on Zuko's shoulder. "I would not be unhappy if you stayed, Zuko, but I must tell you that I believe you should at least attempt speaking with your friends."

"I . . . I'll think about it," Zuko told him. "Thank you."

"For what?"

Zuko took a shaking breath. "For everything. For teaching me, for letting me stay and . . . for saying you'd like it if I stayed."

Jeong Jeong looked at him, a little sadly. "You are most welcome, and I would wish you had heard it more, and from others. It is because I believe the Avatar and his friends will say the same that I feel you should speak with them."

"I will think about it," Zuko repeated.

Perhaps sensing that Zuko wouldn't, or couldn't, say anything more on the topic, Jeong Jeong bid him goodnight and left. For all that he was nervous about the others being very close by, Zuko still fell asleep quickly, a feeling of happiness suffusing him. The Deserter knew who he was and had not rejected him. Had trained him and said that he'd all but mastered fire in those few short weeks. All that was left was increasing his knowledge of bending techniques. That same man wanted Zuko to stay.

Zuko woke up the next morning, refreshed, but still uncertain as to whether or not to talk to Sokka, Aang and Katara. In the end, as had happened with their last separation, Shuga made the decision for him. While Aang was off with whatever lesson Jeong Jeong had planned, she had come back from the valley, disgruntled at being bustled out of the way, and had practically bowled Appa over with an enthusiastic greeting.

Katara and Sokka, who'd been talking whipped around and stared at the two cavorting bisons. "Shuga?" Katara asked, hesitantly. Shuga looked up from where she'd been eagerly nuzzling Appa, and charged over, came to a thunderous halt and licked Katara. Then she licked Sokka.

Zuko, who had discovered her missing from her hiding spot had followed her there, and sighed, saying dryly as he emerged into the clearing, "Bad bison." She just gave him a look of annoyance and marched back to Appa, where the two had clearly gone right back to where they left off.

"Lee?" Katara said. "Lee . . ." She came closer, looking like she might cry, and Zuko felt very nervous that she might. Which was why it took him that much by surprise when she reared back and slapped him. "Where have you been!" she shrieked. "We were worried _sick_ about you!"

"What?" That couldn't be right.

"I was just trying to get an explanation out of you and you _ran away_!" She shouted. She started hitting him with each word. "Stupid jerk . . . idiot . . . what's wrong with you?"

"What?" Clearly she'd gotten delirious or something again.

Sokka pulled his sister away. "What Katara's trying to tell you is that no one was going to throw you out. How could we do that? You'd just saved a town by bending lava and almost passed out."

"What?"

"Is that all you're gonna say?"demanded Katara in exasperation.

"I . . ." Zuko said the first thing that came to his mouth. "I thought you were going to reject me. I wanted to leave before you actually said it. I didn't want to hear anyone else-"

"So you _ran away_ before I had a chance to hear why you'd lied and maybe invite you along again _anyhow_?" Katara asked.

That made an eyebrow raise. "I?" he asked her.

When Katara flushed, Sokka said, "Well, if you'd been paying attention, you might have noticed that Aang wasn't angry at all, just confused, and I already knew. _Katara_'s the only one who might have said otherwise, and she would have been outvoted."

"Does that mean I can come with you again?" The words were out of Zuko's mouth before he could stop them. He'd missed Aang's wide-eyed wonder and Katara's cheerful outlook. He'd really missed Sokka's common sense and stupid jokes. He'd also, although he'd never admit it to anyone, missed Katara having claimed him as her replacement stuffed tiger-seal.

Katara's face lit up and she flung herself at him in a hug that left him breathless. Sokka joined in and Zuko sighed. He looked up to see Shuga curled up against Appa's belly while the larger bison groomed her neck. Sokka said dryly, "I have a feeling Shuga wouldn't let you go alone, and she has no intention of leaving Appa."

And with that, everything was back on very familiar ground. "Shuga! I told you! No calves right now!"

"I bet bison calves are really cute," Katara said.

"They are, and don't encourage her," Zuko told her as he deliberately sat on top of Shuga to keep anything untoward from happening.

Sokka asked, "How exactly would you plan to stop her?" He shook his head reprovingly. "You can't sit up there forever."

"Watch me," Zuko told him, knowing he sounded like he was six.

Katara was already climbing up beside him. "You're just so adorable when you get like this." Then she wrapped herself around him, ruffling his hair and making him squawk in indignation. Sokka gaped and then freaked out about how Zuko was too close to his sister and tackled him. While the boys rolled around, wrestling with each other, Katara made snide comments to Shuga about how boys were so immature.

Aang returned later that evening, looking thoughtful and tired, but he greeted Zuko happily enough and the three told him a long involved story about a friend of their father's, nuns, a bounty hunter with a strange animal and Zhao.

"Wait. Did she have long black hair and spiral tattoos on her arms?" Zuko asked.

"Yeah," Sokka said. "How did you know?"

"Zhao used her to track Shuga and me down. I guess after we escaped, he decided to try going after one of you to get to Aang," Zuko told them.

"Escaped?" Katara gasped. "What happened?"

"After we separated-" started Zuko.

"Ran away," muttered Katara.

"The bounty hunter caught me and Shuga and handed us over to Zhao," Zuko continued, determinedly ignoring her. He told them about his capture and the escape. When he told them about Jeong Jeong cauterising his wound, Katara demanded that he take off his shirt so she could see. "No!" Zuko said. "I'm fine."

"Let me see!"

"No! Sokka! Do something about your sister!"

"Like what?" Sokka had leaned back to enjoy the show.

"Aang?" Zuko pleaded as he tried to fend off the determined waterbender.

Aang smiled cheerily. "I don't know . . . you look kinda _scared_ Lee. You should see your face." The smirk the boy was wearing was absolutely pure evil.

"What? You're getting revenge on me with th-" In his distraction over Aang's sudden payback, Zuko missed one of Katara's grasping hands, and his voice was cut off as she got his shirt mostly over his head, muffling his voice and tangling him hopelessly. He was distracted from his struggles to get out of the shirt and sash he was sure she'd twisted him up in deliberately, by the feel of Katara's warm hands running over his back. It felt odd. But sort of nice.

After a few moments, she stopped and Zuko resumed trying to get out of the shirt. Aang and Sokka just sat there and laughed at him. It was embarrassing, sure, but not as much as it might have been, because they weren't in it to humiliate him. It was good-natured laughter. Katara finally took pity on him and Zuko felt her untie something, shouting through the enfolding cloth, "I knew you did something!"

When the shirt finally came off in her hands, somehow they wound up nose to nose. Katara's eyes went a little wide, and she suddenly shoved the shirt at him. "Here."

Zuko realised she wasn't even looking at his face, but at his chest. There was a brief flush of pleasure that she seemed to enjoy looking, then embarrassment that his best friend's little sister who liked to treat him like a stuffed animal was enjoying looking. He took the shirt away and covered up his confusion by grousing about how she'd deliberately made a fool of him.

The next day, as things seemed to do on a regular basis with the group, everything went to hell again.

Aang had been given his first lesson in gaining access to his inner flame. Zuko was piecing together a new saddle for Shuga out of various odds and ends and Sokka had just headed off to the main camp to see about some more leather. Katara was talking to Aang, while Zuko tuned out the boy's complaints about not going fast enough. They were fairly typical for beginner firebenders who always wanted to start with flame fists or flashy pieces they'd seen in performances. He'd been that way himself when he'd taken his first lessons as a four-year-old. His attention was brought back to the exchange when heard Katara's voice, sounding a little panicky, "Aang! You'll hurt yourself!"

Zuko's head snapped up and he saw Aang, playing with the fire in his hands the way he would have played with his airbending. "Aang," he started, "Fire's not the same as air. You have to be careful."

Aang ignored him, saying something about a juggler, even as he handled the fire with an ease that made Azula's gifts look pathetic.

And then that _idiot child_ spun the fire into a circle around himself and sent out a wave of fire. "Katara!" Zuko shouted. He desperately tried to block the flames, keep them away from Katara, but he wasn't fast enough. She screamed, and Zuko dashed next to her, seeing the horrifying sight of her hands, bleeding, blistered and blackened in a few places. Aang had burned her.

He stared at Aang, furious. "What did you do?" he asked, trying to keep from screaming at the boy.

"I didn't mean to . . ."

Sokka came running having heard his sister scream. "Katara! What's wrong?" He turned to Aang, unerringly. "What did you do?"

"It . . . it was an accident! Katara, I'm so . . ."

Katara fled, sobbing, and Sokka tackled Aang, shouting, "I told you we shouldn't mess around with this! Look what you did! You burned my sister!"

Zuko, cursing, ran for the tent he knew carried supplies for dealing with burns. It was standard kit for any Fire Nation military unit, and he found it quickly. He got to Katara, skidding to the ground next to where she shakingly put her hands in the stream. "Katara, I know it hurts. If you can cool the water around your hands it will help-" he started to instruct her on dealing with the burns as he ripped open the package with aloe, bandages and some other cooling pastes and things he didn't know the names of, only how to use them.

Before he could say any more, however, her hands started to glow a bluish white, and they both gasped in unison. Zuko couldn't stop himself as he reached out to examine her right hand. They were both startled by Jeong Jeong's voice from behind them. "You have healing abilities. The great benders of the water tribe sometimes have this ability." He sat on Katara's other side, looking oddly sad. "I've always wished I were blessed like you - free from this burning curse."

Katara looked puzzled. "But you're a great master. You have powers I'll never know."

"It's not that simple, Katara," Zuko said. "The essence of fire is burning and destruction. Even a hearthfire only exists with the destruction of the wood that fuels it."

Jeong Jeong added, "Water brings healing and life. But fire brings only destruction and pain. It forces those of us burdened with its care to walk a razor's edge between humanity and savagery. Eventually, we are torn apart."

Before anyone could reply to that, a series of fireballs lanced through the air at them, and Zuko brought up a shield of fire to block them. Grateful, once again, that he didn't have to hide who he was any more. "Who-" he started to ask.

Jeong Jeong shouted, "Go get your friends and flee! Do not come back here or you will all be destroyed. Hurry!"

Katara was already running, but Zuko paused. "Master . . ."

"I am proud to have your allegiance, Zuko, but your place is with the Avatar." He hastily shot Zuko a smile. "I will be fine, and I will see you again. Go!"

Doing the last thing his Master had asked of him, Zuko followed Katara's path and found Sokka prepping both Shuga and Appa. Zuko took over the task with Shuga and put the partially finished saddle on her back. "I'm sorry, Shuga, but I can't fly with you until the saddle's done. I'll be on Appa with the others, okay?" he asked her. She rumbled her understanding and stood attentively beside Appa.

Katara arrived back shortly, alone. "Where's Aang?" Sokka asked, concerned.

"There!" Katara said, pointing out onto the river where Aang was baiting Zhao.

"What is he doing?" Zuko asked as Aang waved his behind at the man. Then Zhao set fire to his own boat. "Oh." Said Zuko as Aang led Zhao a merry chase and got the man to destroy his own small fleet of three boats.

"Not bad," Sokka said admiringly.

"Sokka?" Zuko asked.

"Yeah?"

"How did you know I wasn't the one who burned Katara?" He had to know.

Sokka rolled his eyes. "Process of deduction. You looked angry at Aang, and Aang looked guilty. Katara was leaning into you, but she flinched from Aang." He looked Zuko in the eye. "I also know you'd never hurt her on purpose, and you're too much into that whole self-control thing to do it by accident."

Katara gave him the stink eye. "And?" she said, suspiciously.

Sokka flushed. "And I heard you asking Aang what he'd done," Sokka admitted. "But the other evidence still stands!" he said, quickly.

"Thanks, Sokka," Zuko said.

Before Katara could start harassing her brother about puffing up his ego, Aang popped out of the river nearby and shouted, "Have a nice walk home!" at Zhao.

"Aang, come on!" Sokka shouted. Aang leapt onto Appa's head and they took off, Zuko keeping an eye on Shuga. He let Sokka tell Aang that the camp had dispersed. A short time later, Zuko sat up, seeing Aang shift uncomfortably and said, "Aang! Why didn't you say something about those burns?"

"Huh?" Aang said, then looked at his singed arms.

Katara immediately leaned forward. "Here. Let me help you," she said, and uncorked her waterskin. A moment later, Zuko saw that blue-white glow again, and Aang's arms were just as miraculously healed as Katara's hands had been.

"Wow!" said Aang, admiringly. "That's good water."

"When did you learn to do that?" Sokka asked, bewildered.

"When she burned her hands," Zuko said. "She put them in the water and they just healed. It was amazing," he told her. "I didn't get to tell you that, then."

"I guess . . ." Katara trailed off. "I guess I sort of always knew," she offered. Zuko smiled at her, nodding his understanding. Sometimes bending was just like that.

Sokka, predictably groused. "Oh... well then thanks for all the first aid over the years. Like when I fell into the grease briar bramble and that time I had two fish hooks in my thumb!"

"Two?" Zuko and Aang chorused.

Katara rolled her eyes. "He tried to get the first fish hook out with another fish hook."

Zuko tuned out Sokka's ranting, preferring to watch Shuga anxiously. She was a lot smaller than Appa and he still worried about her endurance compared to his. He was also missing Jeong Jeong. He hadn't realised until then how much he missed his real uncle until he was calling another man that. Jeong Jeong had partially filled that hole in him that just wanted to hear approval from one of the adults in his life. Leaving him felt wrong somehow.

Sokka's ranting had finally wound down when Zuko felt Katara squeeze his hand. "Yes?" he asked her.

"It's been a very long month since you left," she told him softly. "And I missed my stuffed tiger-seal. I expect you to do your job tonight."

Maybe Jeong Jeong had been right that his place was here. Zuko smiled at her, then moved to the front of the saddle and joined Aang in harassing Sokka about the fish hooks.


	11. The Northern Air Temple

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: I want to clarify something in advance. There are no smexytiems in this chapter. All snuggling is completely platonic, and due to Zuko's distinct lack of honest, human, physical affection as a child.

* * *

They had listened to the storyteller, then to the man's grandfather tell them about the 'airwalkers' he had seen only the week before. Aang had eagerly descended into chatter about seeing airbenders again, and since the Northern Temple, seemingly the place where they had settled, was mostly on the way, Sokka hadn't objected and Katara had happily agreed. Zuko had kept quiet about it all.

Before they went to bed that evening, he'd cornered Sokka. "I don't think these 'airwalkers' are airbenders. If they are, I have a very bad feeling about it."

"Why do you think so?" Sokka asked. "Does it have something to do with the way the enclaves are, or something?" His friend waved a hand in the air, vaguely.

"Something like that," Zuko agreed. "The reason the Air Nomads have continued to hide is that the Fire Nation still has an extermination policy."

"What?" Sokka asked, shocked. "What do you mean?"

Zuko sighed. "I mean, whenever a Nomad group is found, Fire Nation troops are sent to raze the site to the ground. The ground troops are generally told it's a stronghold of resistance, or that 'enemies of the Fire Nation' are using the civilians as cover." He shook his head sadly, and leaned against a tree trunk. "I've seen the policy being executed from the top."

Sokka stared, horrified. "They just . . . kill everyone?"

"You have to understand, Sokka," Zuko pleaded. "Most of the Fire Nation doesn't know what's going on outside the islands. The soldiers have been told the Earth Kingdom is full of savages who will try to take over the Islands if we don't strike preemptively. The people are told we're bringing civilised ways to the rest of the world."

"They believe that?" Sokka asked, stunned. "How . . .?"

Zuko shrugged. "They have no reason not to. The nobles know better, but then again, we're raised to believe that we are superior to all others. It's our divine right as proven by Sozin's successes at the beginning of the war."

The Water tribesman frowned as he worked through the information. "So you keep most people ignorant, and the nobles are a bunch of jerks."

"The ones with any influence, yes," Zuko said. "Either that, or they're keeping their real opinions quiet so the Fire Lord doesn't do something like this," he gestured at his scar, "to them."

Sokka was still frowning as he looked at Zuko. "You're worried they're Nomads who cut some kind of deal for Fire Nation protection."

Zuko nodded. "Exactly. Either that, or they're overconfident and about to bring down a burn-out."

"When was the last time the Fire Nation had a burn-out?" came Aang's voice from behind them.

Zuko whipped around. "Aang!"

Aang just looked sadly at him. "When, Lee?" Katara stood beside him, looking horrified.

Swallowing back a more biting comment, Zuko said, "About three years ago. Right after I was banished, the orders to check in Cheng Dhu that I was supposed to send astray went through." He closed his eyes. "They torched the whole area and blamed the Earth Kingdom and their Water Tribe allies for the destruction. No one who would be listened to got out."

"Their own people?" Sokka asked, aghast.

"I know, because my mother made sure to send me a letter, letting me know it was my fault she and my sister were on the run with the Nomads who made it out," Zuko said. His lips quirked with black humour. "The memory's a little vague. My father had just tossed me onto my uncle's ship for the start of my banishment." He shook his head a little to clear it. "I just wanted to be prepared for this to not be quite what you hoped, Aang."

Aang soberly nodded, heading for his bedroll, much more restrained than he had been before. Sokka and Katara followed his example. Zuko waffled for a moment or two, then suddenly made his choice.

"Katara?" He poked his head into her tent.

She took one look at him and moved over, making room for him. Zuko crawled in with his own sleeping bag, settled into it, and then curled into her. She wrapped her arms around him, and ruffled his hair. This was better than sleeping with Shuga. "Shh," she told him. "It'll be okay. Your mom and sister are fine."

"She hates me," Zuko mumbled into Katara's shoulder.

"I'm sure she doesn't," she objected.

Zuko shook his head. "As far as my mother's concerned, all firebenders are the same. Evil. I'm a firebender," he explained. Katara didn't let him finish.

"You're not evil," she told him sternly. "And you're never going to say anything like that again."

"Yes, Katara."

"I mean it."

"As you say, M'lady."

"You're making fun of me."

"Only a little."

"Stop it," she poked him.

Zuko just snuggled closer. "You're better for this than Shuga."

"Why?" Katara asked curiously.

"Well, I can actually get my arms around you, whereas I can only lie on top of her. Also, you don't smell like a bison. Most of the time."

"Thanks. Keep that up and you can go back to your own tent."

"Goodnight."

"Goodnight."

It was a very good thing that Sokka loved sleeping late, because it meant Zuko could sneak out of Katara's tent before her brother was up, and didn't have to deal with the fallout that would happen. It wasn't like they were doing anything but sleeping and talking, but Sokka wasn't likely to listen to that if he caught Zuko wrapped around Katara the way he had been that night.

In the end, it was neither incautious airbenders nor anyone faking airbending. It was an inventor with a small settlement that had made themselves a home in the temple. While Aang became angry over the changes that had been made to the temple and Katara stayed with him, Zuko stuck with Sokka. He'd missed his friend, and even though the inventions didn't particularly interest him, it was amusing to watch Sokka enthuse, and he was happy enough spending time with his friend.

It was when the Mechanist was revealed to have been making weapons for the Fire Nation that Zuko found himself again at odds with his friends. While they were making plans for the defense of the temple, Aang cornered Zuko. "Lee? I need to know something."

"What is it, Aang?" he asked, as he continued to rig more gliders to carry various weapons.

"Why weren't you angry that the Mechanist was working for the Fire Nation?" Aang asked.

Zuko shot him an annoyed look, then reined himself in. "You recall what the Southern Air Temple was like, right?"

Aang nodded sadly. "Yes. But what-"

"It has everything to do with it Aang," Zuko told him. "He loves his son, and he wants to protect his people. He's an inventor, not a warrior. Not everyone is able to fight back."

"But his weapons are killing people," Aang insisted.

"Answer this for me," Zuko said. "Who do you care about more? Katara and Sokka, or a bunch of faceless people you'll never meet or know? He _knew_, absolutely _knew_, that his son would die horribly if he didn't comply." Zuko added, "And not just his own son, but all the people here."

There was a long silence. "Katara doesn't think he should have compromised," Aang said.

"Katara holds other people to a very high standard," Zuko said dryly. "Not everyone is able, I mean, as a person, to meet those standards. That's why some people are sages, some are warriors and some are farmers.

"And sometimes," Zuko added, as he admiringly watched Katara and Sokka efficiently work together to raise morale and organise the resistance, "People need someone who can lead them." He turned to Aang. "The Mechanist would be a good peacetime leader or headman. He cares for his people and is willing to do a lot to protect them."

Aang slowly nodded in understanding. "That's why I'm here, isn't it? To do those things for people so they don't have to do things they're not meant to."

"A little, yeah," Zuko said. "I'm not an expert on the Avatar, though. You might have better luck with advice from a historian or a sage."

Zuko, with the agreement of his friends, stayed with the gliders. While he'd been mostly lucky thus far in not being recognised by Fire Nation soldiers, that luck couldn't hold forever, and it was better not to tempt fate. So, he bombarded his countrymen from the sky and tried not to feel too guilty about the fact that at least half of those soldiers probably thought they were stamping out traitors to the Fire Nation.

When Sokka and the Mechanist started falling, Zuko nearly had a heart attack. When Aang arrived on the terrace, he waited off to the side until Katara had finished hugging her brother, and everyone congratulated Sokka on his brilliant fix of the balloon. Eventually the party started to move indoors and Sokka approached Zuko. "Are you going to stay here and sulk? 'Cause there's some great food in there if my nose is any – awk!"

Zuko didn't even know what had possessed him, save that suddenly _he_ was hugging Sokka, clinging to the other boy like his life depended on it. "Don't you ever . . . I can't lose anyone else . . . just like Lu Ten . . ." Zuko was barely aware of what he was saying, only that he was remembering his cousin's return from Ba Sing Se, not as a hero, but as a still body in a box. Lu Ten had died being thrown off the top of the outermost wall of the great city, and when he saw Sokka falling, it was like every nightmare of Lu Ten had been given life.

His cousin had been too old and too busy for the much younger Zuko, but he'd managed to make some time for the boy. The occasional sweet or toy had always meant a lot to Zuko, who'd wanted (when he didn't want to be an airbender), to be just like his affable cousin. Sokka, despite his strangeness, had that same affability.

"There, there," Sokka said, uncomfortably patting Zuko's back. "You're not going to start crying are you? 'Cause that's really unmanly."

The words pulled Zuko back to himself and he abruptly pulled away. "No. I'm sorry. I . . . I don't know what came over me."

"Hey, it's okay," Sokka said. "You were worried, and you've been spending too much time with Katara lately." He smiled gently. "We'll have to make sure to spend some time doing manly things."

Zuko smiled back shakily and replied, "Manly things? Does this mean I'll be trying to hunt while you scare away all the game? Also, I was just worried you'd leave me alone with your sister. The girl is crazy."

Sokka cheerfully took the cue that Zuko was no longer inches from a breakdown and the two wandered back into the temple for the post-fight party. Tomorrow they'd continue on towards the Northern Water Tribe. Tonight, Zuko was going to beat Sokka in a contest of how many leachy nuts he could fit into his mouth at once without chewing.

Katara watched as Aang, Sokka, Zuko and Teo all happily competed in the incredibly stupid contest and went huffing off to spend time with some girls her own age. Zuko rather suspected Katara was having yet another conversation about how stupid boys were with them.

Aang won in the end, which Teo cheerfully attributed to the boy having an unnaturally large mouth, and they settled by the fire. "So what's up with that Maya girl and you?" Sokka amiably inquired of Teo.

Teo shrugged. "She's got a crush on me, I think," he said. "At least, it's the only reason I can think of that she's always following me around looking like that." He shook his head. "I try to be nice to her, but I really wish she'd understand that I'm not interested."

Aang nodded sympathetically. "I know what you mean. When we stopped in this village a while back, there was this girl, Meng, who followed me _everywhere_."

Sokka sat up, frowning. "Wait . . . if the whole, 'How do I get a girl,' thing wasn't about her, then who?"

"Katara," Aang said as though it should have been obvious. Actually it really was, when Zuko thought about it.

Teo grinned. "Yeah, Katara's something else, isn't she?" he asked, looking a little dreamy.

Sokka looked like he'd swallowed a bug. "Katara? My sister?"

"Really," Zuko shook his head in dismay over the other two. "She's completely crazy."

"But she's gorgeous," Teo said, "And I think it's a crazy I like."

"Gorgeous? Katara?" Sokka gasped. "With her stupid hair loopies and silly parka embroidery?"

Aang grinned. "I like the hair loopies."

"They're exotic," agreed Teo.

Sokka made a face. "My _grandmother_ wears her hair like that."

Zuko stayed silent for two reasons. First, he had to travel with both Aang and Sokka and didn't want to be in the middle of the debate either way. Second, he really didn't think of Katara as a gorgeous vixen, he thought of her as a sort of girl-shaped friend. Third, Teo and Aang's agreement on the matter of the hair loopies had him thinking. Her hairstyle and dark skin really were exotic and he was uncomfortably aware that he was now looking at his friend's younger sister like that. Glancing to where she sat with a group of chattering girls, she looked really pretty in the firelight, and he forced his attention back to the conversation.

It was later that evening, when they had all settled in to sleep, that Katara showed up at his tent. Without any sort of preamble, she said, "You know, a lot of the girls here think you and Sokka are really . . ." she trailed off for a moment, waving a hand as she searched for the word, and finally settled on, "Good-looking."

"Teo and Aang think you look 'exotic'," he replied. "It was kind of weird."

She smiled. "I know. Having all these people look at someone you've never even considered looking at that way, and say they're attractive. It just makes you . . . think," she said. "I mean, not that you're bad-looking or anything," she added hastily. "You're pretty good-looking actually, and . . . uh . . ." she blushed.

"Don't worry," Zuko told her. "I understand. You're very pretty," he told her, "I just . . . never thought about it with you, either."

There was a long silence, and then Katara seemed to decide something and dragged her sleeping bag in and settled in next to him. "I've never seen anything like that," she said. "The fight today, I mean. I'm just . . ." She wrapped herself around him. "I'm so glad everyone's okay."

"I know," Zuko told her and pulled her close. "I hugged _Sokka_, if you can believe it."

"He really was amazing," Katara said. "But I'm not telling him. His head's too big as it is."

Zuko chuckled, and tightened his arms briefly before relaxing again. "Fair enough."

"Good night."

"Good night."


	12. The Northern Tribe

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: We made it to the Northern Tribe, people! I'm thinking I might start a new story for each of the seasons, so once I've wrapped up the end of Water, I'd just open a new one for Earth. What say you? Yes, Iroh _is_ coming. At some point. Not telling you when. Thank you all who have this story on alert.

* * *

They'd been flying for a day and a half when Shuga just gave out. She dropped, fast, and Zuko just barely managed to convince her to go far enough to land on a large ice floe. He immediately got off her, unloading the saddle and setting up a camp on the ice.

The other three had taken Appa in order to reduce the load, but Shuga was just too much smaller and weaker than the other bison. A moment later, Appa had splooshed down next to their floe. "You okay?" Aang called from Appa's back.

Zuko shook his head. "Shuga's just too tired. I'm staying here and letting her rest. We'll catch up to you, but I'm not going to hurt her by forcing her to keep going."

There was a brief discussion, and then Sokka was climbing down, taking his pack and some supplies with him. He hopped onto the floe with Zuko, saying, "Then I'll stay here. If we're splitting up, we should still stay in pairs. Katara and Aang are lighter, so they'll be able to keep looking a little longer."

Suddenly, Katara hopped down. "Just a moment," she said, and soon a large bubble of ice had formed around them, with a small entrance to the side. "That should keep you out of the wind."

Sokka grinned at his sister. "Nice work. Be careful, we'll see you in while."

Katara hugged him, then hugged Zuko. "You be careful too." She went and scratched Shuga briefly. "Don't let the boys do anything dumb, okay?" Shuga rumbled an acknowledgement, then rumbled louder, clearly addressing Appa outside. He rumbled back, and Shuga made a sort of content sound, shifting a little in place.

Then Katara hurried off, and it was just the two boys and bison on a big chunk of ice in the middle of the ocean. "Thanks for staying with me," Zuko told Sokka.

"Hey," Sokka said, "We get to rest out of the wind while Katara and Aang do all the hard work. I'm calling it a win for me."

Zuko chuckled, then pulled out a moon peach from Sokka's bag of fruit, giving it to Shuga. She shot him a look that clearly said, _You're kidding. This is it?_ He sighed, telling her, "How much food do you think I can give you? Besides, that's Sokka's stuff. It's mostly jerky."

"What's wrong with jerky?" Sokka demanded as he pulled out some of the jerky."

"Nothing," Zuko told him as he climbed atop Shuga to sit. "But you can't give a bison jerky."

"Fair enough," Sokka said, and joined him on the bison. After a minute or two of companionable silence, Sokka asked, "So what's with you and Katara? She's been spending an awful lot of time near you lately."

Zuko winced inwardly. Katara had taken to sharing space with him like a turtle-duck to water. They'd settle in for the night, she'd wait for Sokka to fall asleep, then she'd creep over to Zuko and curl up with him. Zuko had eventually demanded straight out why she was doing it.

She'd looked at him sheepishly. "I'm scared, okay? Aang's twelve, I'm fourteen, Sokka's sixteen and so are you. We're just _kids_," she told him. "But I can't let on to Aang, because he's got enough to worry about without adding my worrying into his worrying, and Sokka will just get overprotective and annoying." She'd firmly wriggled into him. "And you're here, and you also put off heat like a bonfire."

He looked at Sokka and put all the sincerity he could muster into his voice. "I think she's using me like a heating pack. Firebenders do tend to run hotter."

Sokka raised an eyebrow and moved to pretty much sprawl on top of his friend. "Huh. I think she's right."

"What? Get off!" Zuko tried to get out from under Sokka, but the Water Tribe boy had suddenly decided he wanted to use Zuko as a heating pack himself.

"Aw, c'mon! I'm your best friend," laughed Sokka. "Don't I get to snuggle with the heating pack too?" The wrestling sent them sliding off Shuga, who gave them both a look of supreme disgust.

Zuko was grinning in spite of himself. "No. You're not pretty enough," he said.

"Not that, again," Sokka moaned in disgust. "Please stop making me think of my sister as pretty."

They argued and wrestled and sat together for the next several hours. The two just enjoying the respite and chance to just be two normal, unsupervised teenaged boys hanging out. It came to a sudden end when Katara's dome suddenly melted away, revealing several boats of Water Tribesmen. "Are you Sokka and Lee?" one in the front asked.

"Yes," Sokka called back. "Katara and Aang found the Northern Tribe?"

The man smiled. "Yes. I am Paklat," he told them. "If you will give us a moment, we would be happy to move the floe with us back to the city."

Zuko looked at Shuga. "Well, do you need more rest, or do you think you can fly us there?" Shuga pulled herself to her feet and looked at him expectantly. Zuko grinned at her. "I think Shuga's had enough rest that she should be able to make it the rest of the way with you guiding us."

Paklat inclined his head. "Very well." He turned to the boats and shouted a few orders. In the prow of each boat stood a waterbender, gesturing with smooth, circular motions, to move the boats without the need of a paddle or an engine.

The boys quickly hopped onto Shuga's back and took off after the boats. Soon a massive glacier loomed on the horizon. As they got closer, a sheer wall of pale blue ice became clear on one section of the ice shelf. When the boats pulled in close to it, dozens of benders, standing on two sections of the wall caused it to melt down, allowing the boats and bison into the city. Once inside, they were treated to the view of a complicated system of canals and buildings, all made of sparkling ice in varying shades of whites and blues. It was fully as beautiful, in a stark, cold sort of way, as any of the palaces and royal buildings Zuko had seen in his childhood.

A bellow brought him out of his musings, and Shuga altered her course, heading straight to an open area, where Appa was making a lot of noise next to an enormous pile of hay. They landed, dismounting and pulling Shuga's saddle off her. She immediately snuggled into Appa and started eating like food was going out of style.

Looking around, Zuko spotted Aang and Katara on a dais, seated next to various Important Persons. The two waved, and Katara indicated more seats, clearly reserved for Zuko and Sokka.

Sokka grinned and bounded up next to his sister, while Zuko found himself slowly straggling up the stairs, trying desperately to put himself into some sort of visual order and recall the manners from sitting at the Royal table he hadn't needed for three years. He only felt a little better when he saw Aang looking happy in his slightly dishevelled and worn monk's clothes, completely oblivious to the picture they made of four grubby peasants at a lord's table.

They sat, and a moment later, the tribe's chief stood. "Tonight, we celebrate the arrival of our brother and sister from the Southern Tribe, and they have brought with them someone very special, someone whom many of us believed disappeared from the world until now." Zuko shrank down a little at the end of the table, wishing he were somewhere a little less visible. He wasn't Water Tribe and he wasn't the Avatar. Would these so-reclusive people even accept him? The chief continued, introducing his daughter, declaring her to be of marrying age.

Zuko shook his head a little. Marrying at sixteen. That was a little much. When the waterbending demonstration started, Zuko leaned forward to watch, eager to see what a master could do. He'd seen many similar types of displays as a child, but they were all firebenders. The movements and the displays done here were much less like the katas of his childhood, and more like a dance.

That was when Sokka broke the moment, pretty much leaning over Zuko to talk to the princess who had taken a seat at the end of the table. In the kind of silly voice only a third rate pantomime actor would think was charming, Sokka said, "Hi, there. Sokka, Southern Water Tribe."

Because it would be rude not to introduce himself now, and because he was hoping to remind Sokka that he was _right there_, Zuko said, resorting to the formalities he was drilled in, "Lee, of Cheng Dhu. My felicitations, princess." Bowing to her as one of equal rank in full court style, Zuko felt some little part of him relax. Court formalities he knew. You couldn't go wrong with over-formality.

She smiled at them both, bowing slightly, "Very nice to meet you."

Still leaning over Zuko, practically in his friend's lap, Sokka said, "So . . . uh . . . you're a princess!" Clearly grasping at straws to find a topic of conversation, Sokka continued. "You know, back in my tribe, I'm kinda like a Prince myself!"

Zuko stared at him, bewildered by two things. First, that Sokka would say something that stupid, and second, that Yue seemed to think it was . . . well . . . something positive. Endearing maybe?

"Prince of what?" Katara asked in disbelief from Sokka's other side.

"A lot of things! Uh, do you mind? I'm trying to have a conversation here!" Sokka blustered.

Zuko, wanting to get out of the middle of whatever Sokka was trying to do with the princess said, "How about we trade seats, Sokka?"

"Okay!" his friend said eagerly.

Katara looked at him disapprovingly. "Why would you do that?"

Zuko shot her an annoyed look. "Because your brother was practically sitting in my lap while trying to woo her?" He glanced over to where the princess still seemed to be somehow charmed by Sokka's dubious behaviour. "Can you explain to me if it's just a girl thing that has her acting like Sokka's actually charming?"

Katara stared for a moment, then leaned around Zuko to look. "Wow. She really is. I . . . don't know."

"Maybe," Zuko said in an undertone, "She thinks he's . . .special. You know, not that smart, so it's kind of like when a three-year-old proposes marriage. It's cute, just not in an attractive way."

Katara glanced around him, and said, "That makes more sense than not." She shook her head. "What _are_ we going to tell people about you?" She paused. "I mean, do you want to be open about your bending or what?"

Frowning, Zuko thought for a minute, and then said, "Let's stick with me being a nonbender unless something comes up. If it does, we'll tell people I'm an airbender who's travelling with Aang because he's the first airbender I've met, and _my_ teacher."

"Right. You're hiding and we're just keeping your secrets."

Zuko smiled at Katara. "I really want to thank you for that. You could have-"

"No we couldn't have left you behind or treated you like a leper or whatever stupid thing you're thinking, Lee," Katara told him sharply. "So stop it."

The rest of the evening went without a hitch, and for the first time in a very long time, Zuko found himself housed for the night in a palace. It made him feel rather homesick. He missed his old room in the capitol; he missed his canopied bed and the warm red rooms. He missed the garden and his mother's turtle duck pond.

His room was ornately decorated and luxuriously appointed, but it was all so exotic and alien from the decorations and luxury he had been used to that it only highlighted how far he was from everything he still thought of as home.

While he was unpacking his few things for the duration of their stay, Katara stopped by. "So this is where they put you," she commented.

Zuko smiled, a little weakly, at her. "How's your room?"

"Really nice," she said. "But it's reminding me of home. Not," she gestured around at the ornate ice sculpture that embellished all the walls and furniture, "All the decoration, but the ice and the cold. It's like home. Just . . ." She trailed off, looking uncertain.

"Just not," Zuko said, feeling a little better to have company in his homesickness. "It's kind of like that in reverse for me," he told her. "The decorations and the luxury, that's all familiar. Like the palace where I grew up. But the ice makes it . . . strange."

"I was wondering a little," Katara said. "Why you didn't want to talk to Yue."

Zuko shot her a sideways look. "You mean because Sokka was drooling all over her in his attempt to seem sophisticated?"

"She _is_ pretty," Katara admitted, "But that's not why. You're . . . from a noble family," she said. "I thought you might have had some . . . things," she gestured aimlessly, "in common."

"Things?" Zuko asked, his smile widening into an amused grin. "Besides the fact that she and I are both noble-born, there's really not much we'd hold in common."

Katara sighed. "I guess I just thought you might be getting tired of us normal people and want to talk to someone else more . . . upscale."

"Upscale?" Zuko stared at her. "People are people, Katara. I'd take a million of you over any one of the nobles of the Fire Nation, and I'm willing to bet I'd do the same for some spoiled Northern princess."

Katara smiled at him. "Thanks, Lee," she said. She leaned forward, kissed his cheek, and left, saying goodnight.

Zuko found himself blushing a little for no reason as he went to bed.

The next morning, Katara and Aang were supposed to be off at their first waterbending lesson and Sokka had plans to woo the princess, so Zuko decided to explore the city. It was as he passed around the outermost edges that a decoration carved into the glacier ice caught his eye.

Three spirals inside a circle. He might not have even noticed if it weren't for the way the light had hit the ice, cutting through the smooth surface to show the decoration inside. Like a solid glass paperweight with designs somehow worked into the inside of the dome.

Zuko had once overheard that symbol marked a nearby location of an airbending enclave. His mother had been one of those high enough up in the hierarchy to be aware that her enclave wasn't the last one, but Zuko had only managed to find tiny scraps of information about the others.

But this symbol meant there was an airbending enclave somewhere within or near the Northern Tribe city. Zuko started looking around, carefully. He almost missed it, the ice having been carefully formed to give the illusion of a narrow crack. But on closer inspection, it was the entrance to a tunnel into the glacier.

Ultimately the hidden areas of the enclaves were for retreat in desperation, and for a safe place to raise the bisons, and for the bisons to hide in. Most of the airbenders in an enclave were in and out frequently, but the utmost secrecy was exercised in relation to the bison areas. Zuko had passed the first hurdle, which was getting into the general area. Now he had to find his way to the actual hidden zone.

Following the corridor eventually spat him out at the top of the glacier, a good distance from the city. Zuko headed back down the tunnel and carefully checked the walls. Several entrances, hidden just as the first one was, as thin cracks in the wall, led to dead ends or out to other locations on top of the ice.

On a hunch, he went back and up and down every side hallway. His diligence was rewarded by a hole in the ceiling, only visible if you knew what to look for. Like similar apertures in the Cheng Dhu enclave.

Creating a careful and narrow burst of air, Zuko sent it into the hole and was rewarded by a hidden door in the ice opening as a mechanism, based originally on the temple entrances, was triggered. Zuko slipped quickly inside, followed the tunnel through the ice, and finally found his way into a large open area filled with bisons, laughing children and airbenders.

He froze as he felt a spear suddenly jab into his side. "Who are you?" growled a voice in his ear.

"My name is Lee," Zuko said, trying not to make any sudden moves. "I'm from the Cheng Dhu enclave."

"The what?" demanded the man. "There are no other enclaves, we're the last one."

Deciding that a little dissembling was the better part of valour in this case, Zuko said, "So did I. Then I saw the markers and came looking."

For a long moment, Zuko thought he was going to be killed. Then the man grabbed him and started dragging him around the massive enclosure. They stopped near a middle-aged man who turned, frowning, and asked, "Oluk, who is this?"

"I found him at the entrance. He claims to be from another enclave of airbenders," Oluk informed the man.

The man's head snapped up and he fixed Zuko with a surprised look. "Oluk, please leave us," he told the guard. "This way," he told Zuko, leading the way to another tunnel that let out into a small room that was clearly being used as an office. "Which enclave?" he demanded once they were safely ensconced.

"Cheng Dhu," Zuko said. "My mother," he paused, hating the way his voice always broke a little when he spoke of her. "My mother married high in the Fire Nation to arrange distractions for us," he told the man. "She was forced to leave my father and I . . . I didn't do as well as she did at protecting our enclave. Then I was banished." Zuko took in a shaky breath. "There was a burnout and I'd been hoping to find another enclave ever since."

The man fixed Zuko with a stare for all this, but when Zuko finished his story, the man relaxed. "I am Yanto, the head of this enclave," he told Zuko. "Are you one of those who came with the Avatar?" he asked.

"Yes," Zuko said. "Would it be possible for me to – at least – tell Aang, the Avatar, about this? Our bisons would no doubt like a chance to spend time with a herd."

Yanto shot him a look of curiosity. "At least? Who else do you wish to tell?"

So Zuko told him about how he'd met the others and how he'd been under the impression that Aang was just being a reckless kid and had exposed everything to Katara and Sokka. "I can promise you that they wouldn't tell anyone about this, but we're travelling together and I hate keeping secrets from them if I can help it."

"As long as it goes no further," Yanto told him. "Should it come to pass that the Fire Lord is defeated and a sovereign we can trust not to stage attacks on our people is put in place I would be happy to tell the truth to the world."

Zuko nodded his understanding. "But until then, we keep our secrets," he agreed.

Yanto stood and said, "Good. Come with me. I must introduce you, and we will arrange a proper ceremony to remember our brothers and sisters lost in this burnout." They made their way out and into the main enclosure, Yanto pointing out the bisons' entrance on the way through. Zuko told him about the burnout and how it came about. When he finished, the man said, "Your mother is wrong, Lee. You did far better than anyone had a right to expect, and your desire to protect those soldiers shows compassion. Perhaps foolish compassion, as they are the enemy, but no one can fault you for your efforts."

"If I'd been _there_, done what I was supposed to, there wouldn't have been a burnout," Zuko said miserably. He couldn't let this go. Yanto hadn't been there and he didn't know what happened. Only what Zuko said.

"Perhaps, perhaps not," Yanto told him. "There is no way at this point of knowing." He mounted a few steps up to a podium. Then Zuko's eyes widened as the man _bended_ his voice to be heard in every corner of the place without shouting. "Brothers and sisters. I have news that is both good and grave to be passed on. Today we have been joined, for a time, by this young man, Lee, who brings us this news. News that we are not the only airbenders left in the world."

Murmuring erupted throughout the enormous space. Yanto had taken the necessity of exposing that secret with remarkable aplomb, but as he'd told Zuko, Oluk couldn't keep a secret this big to save his life. So rather than lose the trust of his people, he was going ahead with telling part of the truth. Someone shouted, "He looks Fire Nation! Can we even trust him?"

Zuko flinched. It was one prejudice he hadn't had to put up with at home, because the benders in Cheng Dhu had blended into Fire Nation society the way these had blended with Water Tribe. Yanto spoke sharply to the speaker. "And we look like we are part of the Water Tribe, do we not?" he demanded. "It does not make us waterbenders."

"Prove it!" the voice shouted back, and a knife flew threw the air at Zuko. He just barely corrected his first impulse, which was to grab his blades and cut the knife from the air. He swung his hands around, twisting them in a motion he'd learned by watching Aang, and neatly blocked the knife, causing it to fall to the floor. Dead silence fell along with it.

"If you are quite finished?" Yanto demanded with some asperity. "For he is here in part due to a burnout of his home enclave, with the knowledge that his family has been scattered to the four winds." He looked around at the gathered benders as he continued. "In three days time we shall have a memorial for these cousins we have lost, and to welcome both Lee, and the Avatar, to our home."

With that, Yanto stepped down and Zuko was suddenly surrounded by airbenders who wanted to know everything about him and his former enclave. Eventually Zuko made his excuses and left. It had been a long day and he had a lot to tell Aang, Katara and Sokka.

It turned out, so had they. Katara was furious that the bending master wouldn't teach her because she was a girl, Aang was angry because she was angry, but also because the man's teaching style was all about insulting his students into better performance. Sokka wasn't much better because the princess had rejected him in particularly humiliating fashion. With everyone in such a state of upset, Zuko didn't even have a chance to get a word in edgewise before Aang and Katara had hurried off to practice somewhere and Sokka was depressed enough about the princess that it really didn't seem the time.

The next morning, Zuko woke to the news that Katara and Aang had been caught bending together and Master Pakku had refused to teach Aang because women were only allowed to learn healing waterbending in the Northern Tribe.

"That's ridiculous," Zuko said to Sokka as they followed a steamingly furious Katara and a nervous Aang up to the hall. "You lose half of your potential fighting force this way."

Sokka stared at him. "You have women in the Fire Nation _army_?" he asked Zuko.

"Of course," Zuko told him. "The drill sergeant who runs the training for new recruits at the capital is a woman. She's terrifying."

"But-" Sokka started.

"May I remind you of the Kyoshi Warriors before you say anything else?" Zuko interrupted pointedly.

Sokka opened his mouth again, paused, then closed it, looking thoughtful. Up on the dais, Katara and Aang pleaded their case for Pakku to take Aang back as a student. When Pakku smirked at Katara being backed into apologising for something she should never have needed to apologise for, she snapped.

"No! No way am I apologizing to a sour old man like you!" As she spoke, the floor cracked and nearby pots of water nearly exploded reacting to her fury. "I'll be outside . . . if you're man enough to fight me!" she finished.

Then she stormed off. Dimly Zuko was aware of Aang trying to smooth things over, assuring Arnook and Pakku that Katara didn't really mean it, and Sokka dryly telling Aang that, "Yeah, I think she did." He was too caught up in the memory of another challenge, and his hands were shaking as he found himself stumbling after her.

He didn't even know how his legs carried him to her. "Katara!"

"Lee, I-" she stopped. "Lee? What's wrong? You look sick? Are you okay?" She guided him to the side, making him sit on the stairs.

Zuko looked at her, suddenly overwhelmed by the memory of searing flesh. "Katara, don't. Find another teacher. Don't . . . don't challenge him."

"Why?" she asked defensively. "You don't think I can fight, either?"

"No!" Zuko grabbed her hands, trying to force the words out. For three years he'd danced around the Agni Kai in his memory, but this challenge, head-on, was too close and Zuko had to shake his head a little to clear it. "The scar on my face. My father gave it to me, yes." He told her, clinging to her hands to keep her there. "But it was in an Agni Kai. A traditional bending duel. I wasn't . . . I wasn't ready. Just . . . don't. Please."

Her face softened. "Oh, Lee. This isn't the Fire Nation and Pakku isn't your father. He's a crusty old armadillo-goat." She cupped his face in her hands. "I'll be fine."

Sokka and Aang had arrived without Zuko noticing. "Katara, you don't have to do this for me," Aang told her. "I can find another teacher."

That got her back up again and she yanked off her coat, tossing it at Sokka. "I'm not doing this for you. Someone needs to slap some sense into that guy." When Pakku walked by a moment later, Zuko could only hear the buzzing in his ears as Katara chased after him and finally hit him from behind with a water whip.

Katara was amazing, and as the fight went on, Zuko found he was gradually able to forget his own memories of the Agni Kai and watch the match. It was fascinating the way neither dodged like an airbender, and didn't meet force for force like an earthbender or firebender. Instead, they either diverted or caught and turned the attack around on each other. Where a firebending duel was a series of short, sharp attacks and defences, the waterbending duel was all give and take.

And then suddenly Katara was pinned in a cage of a hundred razor-sharp spikes of ice, and Zuko saw Katara struggling. Something in him, the same thing that had wanted someone to come and help him that horrible day in the arena, roared to life. He was barely aware of the exchange of words between Katara and the old man, only that she was trapped and struggling and he couldn't stand to see her wriggling like a landed fish.

He was down the steps and his blades made short work of the ice. Then he was in front of her, checking her over for injury in a kind of daze. "You're okay."

"Lee, come on, sit down." Katara was pulling him aside and Sokka was there, looping one of his arms over the other boy's shoulder. The world cleared up again and Katara was off to the side of the small room they'd made their way into, fabricating some story about his firebending father throwing his nonbending son into an Agni Kai arena.

A few minutes later, Zuko found himself face to face with the bending master. Unsure of what the man wanted, Zuko did the first thing that sprang to mind. He stood, bowed deeply and said, "I'm sorry for interfering in your duel."

The other man pulled him upright. "You have not shamed yourself in any way," he told Zuko firmly. "Many warriors have suffered from their memories of battle impinging on their lives. What has happened to you is no less harrowing than any battle." Then he shot the young man a small, wry, grin. "I have agreed to teach the both of them waterbending, however. So I trust you will not interfere in my teaching in a similar way?"

Zuko couldn't speak, so he just nodded. He watched the man stride off, and then he was surrounded by his friends. "Are you okay?" Katara asked. "I'm sorry I didn't realise how badly off you were. I would have . . . I don't know. I still would have challenged Pakku, but I would've made sure you didn't have to watch."

"Thing really are very different outside the Fire Nation," Zuko told her, feeling too dazed to even contemplate real conversation.

Sokka said, "Am I going to have to keep breaking out the smelling salts whenever Katara gets in a fight? 'Cause I'll have to stop her from fighting on the principle of not watching you faint again."

That brought him out of it. "I have one bad set of flashbacks and suddenly I'm a liability? This from the guy whose only weapon is a boomerang?" Zuko sniped back.

Aang piped up, "You still look really pale, Lee. Maybe you should lie down."

"I'm fine," Zuko insisted. A quick glance around the room told him they were alone. "Actually, there was something I wanted to tell you guys last night, but I didn't get the chance."

"What's that?" Aang asked.

Zuko grinned. "There's an airbender enclave here. I found them yesterday. We can put Shuga and Appa in with a bison herd while we're here."

Aang's eyes were wide and he grinned. "Where are they? Can you show me now?"

"Absolutely."


	13. The Siege of the North

Disclaimer: I don't own anything in this story, in fact a lot of the dialogue will probably be cadged straight from the show itself, which means I own even less.

Author's Notes: So my decision has been made, this will be broken into separate stories for separate books. I now have nefarious plans relating to that. Also, I have tampered with timing a bit. Just pretend Aang's meditation goes on for longer in this than it did in the series. Or that Zhao got there sooner. Same diff. Also also, yes this is long, but otherwise the two chapters are really shorter than I want. This is the end of the first season. I hope to see you all soon in a brand new sequel story, Airbender's Child: Earth.

* * *

They had brought Appa and Shuga into the enclave herd, and the two bisons had promptly settled in. Bisons were herd animals, so the two were ecstatic in a bison sort of way. Shuga was a little anxious and followed Appa around, apparently worried that her prime specimen of male bison would get sidetracked by the other female bisons in the herd. So, Appa spent a lot of time grooming Shuga and caused Zuko to spend inordinate amounts of time wandering by the bisons to keep an eye on the two of them.

Katara joined him, but chose not to help, instead spending her time cooing over the bison calves which were cuter than a pile of turtle seal pups.

Sokka just seemed to fit in with the enclave nonbending warriors. They were more relaxed and informal than the ones in the Northern Tribe, and Sokka happily traded stories about hunting in the tundra with them.

It was Aang who was having trouble. These were airbenders, but they were nothing like the Nomads he'd grown up with. Stories, traditions and culture contained only traces of the ones Aang knew. Worse, at least to Aang, was the number of airbenders who came to him asking for training. For the first time, Aang was able to truly see how much they had lost.

That was not to say that they spent every minute with the airbenders. Katara and Aang had classes with Master Pakku and Sokka was trying very hard to woo the princess despite her being engaged to someone else. Zuko could only assume it was because his friend either wanted her to join them when they left or hadn't thought that far ahead.

Two days later, a ceremony owing much to the traditions of the Water Tribes was held.

"Brothers and sisters. We are here to offer our respects to the people lost to a burnout three years ago. One of the sons of that enclave is here today to send his wishes to guide those lost spirits beyond the waters into the ocean of the Spirit World . . ."

As Yanto went on, Aang seemed to become twitchier by the second. When the memorial was finished and small ice sculptures in the shape of flowers had been set to floating off on the ocean, Aang finally exploded, quietly, at Zuko. "It's all wrong! How can you do it all wrong?"

Zuko shrugged. "I wouldn't know their traditions. I'm from the Fire Nation enclave. The reference there would have been to becoming one with the flames and the sunlight of the Spirit world."

Aang's left eye twitched again. "It's becoming at one with the winds of the Spirit World! How can people forget it?"

"Apparently, a hundred years with all the sages dead and gone does a lot for the loss of tradition," Zuko said, dryly.

"But that's the way it's always been said!" Aang exclaimed.

Yanto had come up behind them as they talked and said, "But for those who were attempting to hide within another nation a mistake such as that could not be afforded. I can only assume they changed the words of the traditional ceremony to keep the form, but disguise it as being of the nation they were hidden in."

"It just feels wrong," Aang said stubbornly. His shoulders drooped in defeat. "It's just another thing I'm going to have to get used to, isn't it?" he asked.

Yanto took him by the shoulders. "Perhaps. But your presence gives us all the hope that we may be able to reclaim our heritage," he told the Avatar. "When it is safe, I am very certain you will be besieged by airbenders who wish to try a return to the old ways."

"You really think so?" Aang asked.

"I do."

Sokka and Katara caught up with Zuko afterwards while he was stationed by the bisons, keeping a baleful eye on Shuga and Appa. "That was beautiful," Katara said. "Aang told us it's been taken from the traditional Air Nomad ceremony."

"He would know," Zuko replied. "He was kind of upset about it, actually. He was angry about how it took out everything to do with air and replaced it with water."

"He has trouble getting that things have changed sometimes," Sokka said with a shrug. "You know that."

"I do," Zuko said. "Sometimes I think he'd have an easier time understanding that the Fire Nation is the enemy if I weren't here."

"Hmm," Sokka responded noncommittally. "Uh, Lee?"

"Yeah?"

"Um . . . you said you were pretty high up in the Fire Nation nobility, right?"

Zuko raised an eyebrow and turned to Sokka. "Yes," he said hesitantly. "Why?"

"Well . . . uh . . . ?"

"What?"

Katara, who had busied herself with petting a bison heifer, spoke up from behind them. "Sokka wants to pick your brain about how to impress Yue, because he's worried his ordinary self needs something more royal to impress her."

"Oh," Zuko said. "I . . . um . . . I'm not really sure that what I know would apply."

"What do you mean?" Sokka said, looking a little frantic. "I've seen you get all formal and stuff. You've got it perfect. Can't you give me a hint, here?"

Zuko winced. "Fire Nation formalities aren't the same as Earth Kingdom aren't the same as Water Tribe. If you start aping Fire Nation formalities, you're not just going to get _those_ wrong, because it took me training from the time I was three until I was thirteen to learn what I know, but you're not even going to be doing the right ones."

"Oh," Sokka said, despondently.

Zuko sighed. "I'll see what I can do. We can meet in the evenings, okay?"

"Yes!" Sokka pumped a fist in the air and practically danced off, tossing a "Thank you!" over his shoulder.

Katara shot him a look. "Did you have to encourage him?"

"Why shouldn't I? He likes her a lot, and she should know there are other options than just doing what her parents tell her to." Zuko was rather proud he worked Yue in. He was actually just doing it because he wanted to help Sokka, but that made it sound a lot more legitimate.

"You mean, just like you need to understand that you're better than whatever _your_ parents have said?" Katara said, rather shrewdly.

"That's different."

"Not really," Katara told him. She left, and Zuko decided that, rather than think about it, he was going to go sit on Shuga because Appa was getting a fresh look in his eye. Neither bison was particularly happy about it.

They had been there for a week when Zuko was approached for the first time, by a nervous-looking girl. "Excuse me," she said. "You are Lee, right?"

"Yes," he turned to face her. "Can I help you with something?"

"My name is Agala. Can we . . ." she looked around and lowered her voice. "Can we talk somewhere privately? Please?"

Zuko frowned, but acquiesced. They left the hidden compound, entering the main city and he followed her to what turned out to be her home. Once they were inside, she said, "I'd heard that the girl who came with you – she's being taught waterbending by Master Pakku."

He nodded, feeling a little perplexed as to where this was going. "Yes. She's taking classes with Pakku in the mornings and studying healing with Yugoda in the afternoons."

"So . . . you agree with her, and the Avatar, that girls – women – should be allowed to learn to fight?" she asked.

Another aspect of the assimilation of the airbenders into the Northern Tribal culture had just appeared. "You don't get to learn airbending?" Zuko asked, baffled.

She sighed and gestured for him to sit on a cushion before joining him. "We learn the arts of airbending. Music, dance, smoke painting and the same basics of meditation and control as the boys."

Zuko stared. "How . . . how do you play music with airbending?" he asked, baffled. "And smoke painting? What _is_ that?"

"You . . . you don't know?" she asked.

He smiled a little at her. "Keep in mind, I grew up in the Fire Nation. While your enclave has been absorbed into the Water Tribe, mine was part of the Fire Nation. We are far more interested in learning different ways to use bending in war than we are in learning how to use it for art." He shook his head. "Unfortunately, I suspect it's carried over a lot into my old enclave. Dancing is forbidden in the Fire Nation, and we _did_ dance, but . . . I suspect it won't be anything like the way you do."

"Oh," she said. "You see, sound travels through the air. If you manipulate the air, just so, you can create tones in it." She suited hand gestures to the words, and soon music was wafting through the air. Different tonal types meant that sometimes it sounded like pipes, sometimes bells and sometimes a huqin, a stringed instrument played with a bow. It was very beautiful, and Zuko found himself smiling.

"That's wonderful," he told her. "What's smoke painting, though?"

She grinned. "I don't have everything I need, here, but I can show you a little." She went to the small firepit in the room and plucked a handful of something from a box next to the fire. "Normally a painter would have several fires, each with different additions making different colours of smoke." She tossed her handful in, and the fire began to smoke fiercely. Before it could begin to cloud the room, she again moved her hands into a complex dance.

Before Zuko's eyes, the smoke swirled and danced, forming pictures. They moved and it was as though someone had brought an illustrated scroll to life. "That's amazing," he told her.

Agala sighed, twisted her hands, sending the smoke out the smokehole in the ceiling and sat back down. "Maybe it is, to you," she said, a little bitterly. "But I want to learn how to use my bending for something other than pretty pictures. Art is important, the way we pass on who we are to our children and all of that." She sounded as though she were reciting a lesson she'd heard too many times. Zuko knew the sound, he'd recited similar kinds of lessons himself.

He guessed. "You want to feel like you can _use_ your bending for something, even if it's fighting."

"Yes!" she said. "That's it, exactly." She looked at him eagerly. "There are a lot of us who feel like we're not given the chance to know who we are because we can't even _try_."

"So why come to me?" he asked. "Why not ask Aang? He's a fully trained airbender. Possibly even better trained than the benders here." He shot her a wry look. "He can do things with air that the so-called masters of air where I'm from wouldn't even dream of."

Agala bit her lip a moment, and then said, "He's very busy and . . . and sometimes I . . . we feel that he doesn't quite understand the airbenders here."

Zuko nodded slowly. "You mean like when he wants to know why no one is doing the winter salute to the Chinook and how it is you can be eating meat?"

"Yes." Agala nodded eagerly. "He just doesn't know what it is to live in fear the way we have and the inhumanity of the Fire Nation. He just doesn't _know._"

"And I'm a substandard bender trained in the airbending that's developed in the Fire Nation," Zuko told her. "I'm hardly a bender at all, for all I can do."

She fixed him with a firm look. "That's better than we've had. Please, Lee."

Zuko closed his eyes, but he couldn't erase the look on her face, and he couldn't deny that Aang needed to focus on learning water. Most of all, he couldn't deny anyone the chance to learn bending. He'd wanted that learning, and finally getting it from Jeong Jeong had been one of the most wonderful experiences of his life. "Alright," he told her. "I'll do it. Is there a good time and place for us to meet?"

With that, Zuko found his time being eaten up by teaching a class of girls the basics of airbending as he'd learned it. It was amazing to spend time with a class full of airbenders who looked at him with respect. Some of them quickly dropped out, having discovered that they were not meant to fight, but even those thanked him for the opportunity after their last classes.

Now they were all busy with their own projects, Zuko barely saw the others. He'd see Katara when she was watching the bison calves, or Aang when the boy was trying to pass on the traditions he'd been raised with to resistant water-air people and Sokka when he was among the enclave warriors. The lessons in formal behaviour having been cancelled after Sokka's first highly abortive attempt at aping nobility.

It all came to an abrupt end one day when his class was interrupted by one of the girls who had decided she didn't want to fight, but would be their lookout, came hurtling in.

"A fleet of dozens of Fire Nation Ships have been sighted approaching!"

* * *

The airbenders had immediately split into two groups. Those who had to join with the rest of the Water Tribe in fortifying and preparing the city for the siege, and those who set themselves the task of organising the enclave to ensure it was totally hidden from potential invaders.

Zuko stopped quickly to talk to Yanto. "Yanto, I have to go and join my friends. I know they'll be in the defence and I can't be anywhere else."

Yanto smiled at him, clapping a hand to his shoulder. "It's quite alright, Lee. I understand as well as anyone the need for dissembling, and for someone to defend against the invasion." As Zuko turned to leave, he added. "I also thank you for teaching my daughter and her friends something to defend themselves. As much as I cannot approve of women in battle, she reminded me that it is foolish to give them no options to defend against firebenders."

"I wasn't doing it for that," Zuko told him. "I was doing it because I have seen many capable woman warriors and denying them the right to choose that path is wrong." Since it seemed their secret was out, he wasn't going to lie about his motivations. There were too many things he'd been lying about as it was.

He left and caught up with Aang in time to hear the airbender say, "I wasn't there when the Fire Nation attacked my people. I'm gonna make a difference this time."

Zuko jogged up to him. "If you're going out there with Appa, you can expect that I'm joining you, Aang."

Aang turned to him. "Lee, you shouldn't-"

"Shouldn't what?" he asked. "I'm no good with distance weapons and I'm not going to wait on the wall until the close fighting starts. I have my own bison and we can do just as much as you can out there." He whistled sharply, and Shuga joined Appa on the wall, expectantly.

Aang looked at him for a moment, then smiled. "Thanks, Lee." They mounted up and took to the air. As they headed for the ships on the horizon, a fireball was launched at the wall of ice that protected the city.

"Let's go!" shouted Aang.

The first boat they took down together, but it was soon apparent they were better off spreading their attacks among the enemy fleet. It was from high in the air that Zuko spotted something that sent his heart into palpitations.

At the helm of one of the ships, as had been expected, was Zhao. Standing there with his smug smile and perpetual sneer, the admiral was looking deeply self-satisfied. Beside him however . . .

"Uncle?" Zuko whispered.

He'd never thought this would truly happen. His uncle had given up such things after Lu Ten's death at Ba Sing Se. The one thing Zuko had always thought he could trust in was that his uncle Iroh would never be on the other side of the battlefield. But there he was, beside Zhao at the head of the fleet. Was the great general now at the head of this small army?

No. He couldn't be, Zhao would never look that pleased.

Why was he there?

Pushing his questions aside, Zuko turned away and attacked another ship, turning his firebending against his own people. This was no time for pretty ethics and hiding. He had to protect the Tribe and he had to protect this enclave where he hadn't been able to protect his own.

On some level, he knew it would come back to cause him trouble, but he left his uncle alone.

Hours later, he and Shuga made their way back, exhausted. His bison collapsed beside him. Katara and Yue came running up to them. "Lee," said Katara. "Are you okay?"

He shook his head. "I'm exhausted and Shuga's worse than I am. We managed to down at least ten ships out there, Aang's done more, but there's a whole fleet." He just sprawled where he landed, and Shuga lay next to him, her panting gradually subsiding.

Katara knelt next to him. "It's okay. You've done well. That's ten fewer ships than before." she hugged him and he leaned into her a moment before relaxing back against Shuga again.

They waited together, and as Zuko had expected, Aang appeared a half an hour later. "I can't do it," he said, collapsing beside Appa. Shuga had recovered enough that she made her way to Appa's side, starting to groom him comfortingly. Aang shook his head, putting it in his hands. "I can't do it," he said again.

Katara stood up from where she'd been beside Zuko, asking, "What happened?"

"I must have taken out a dozen Fire Navy ships, but there's just too many of them. I can't fight them all." Aang seemed to be despairing.

Zuko shot an irritated look at Yue when she responded to this with, "But, you have to! You're the Avatar!"

"He's twelve years old," he snapped at her. "Not a god or one of the great spirits."

"Lee," Katara said reprovingly.

He just sent her the same annoyed look. Aang was just a kid and it was ridiculously unfair of these people to expect him to wave a hand and make the fleet disappear. Fire soldiers didn't just go away. Fire Nation people fought, and they kept fighting.

They waited together in silence for a while, watching the sun set, and the moon rise. The fire nation ships eventually pulled back. Yue, staring at the full moon suddenly began to speak. "The legends say the moon was the first waterbender. Our ancestors saw how it pushed and pulled the tides and learned how to do it themselves."

"I've always noticed my waterbending is stronger at night," Katara commented.

Yue nodded. "Our strength comes from the Spirit of the Moon, our life comes from the Spirit of the Ocean. They work together to keep balance." It made sense, Zuko thought. Since the strength of a firebender came from the sun, their elemental opposite's should come from the sun's opposite, when firebending was weakest.

Aang's thoughts, however, were on a different path. "The Spirits! Maybe I can find them and get their help!" he exclaimed.

"How can you do that?" Yue asked.

Katara perked up. "The Avatar is the bridge between our world and the Spirit World. Aang can talk to them!"

They were all really getting into this idea now. "Maybe they'll give you the wisdom to win this battle!" Yue said eagerly.

"Or, maybe they'll unleash a crazy amazing spirit attack on the Fire Nation!" Aang declared with a slightly crazed grin.

"Or, maybe you'll get eaten by a spirit animal while you're on the spirit plane and we'll be left with an empty body," Zuko snapped. "Do you recall at all what happened the last time we tangled with spirits?" Katara gave him a look that he read as meaning 'party pooper.' "Oh, don't look at me like that. I nearly got tricked into killing myself in there. I don't care if Aang is some sort of magical bridge, it's dangerous."

"You never mentioned that," Katara said.

Zuko glared at her. "It's a private thing a trip through the spirit world," he said. "And anyhow, I don't really trust water spirits because it was one that tried to get me dead."

"What?" Katara gasped. "Well it couldn't have been a good spirit," she denied.

"Hmmph." Zuko groused. "All I know is that a talking tiger seal tricked me into drinking water that p . . . made me nearly die of cold sickness," he hastily corrected. "If it weren't for that tiger, I would have died."

The three gave him weird looks and chose to send Aang off to the spirit world anyhow. Zuko trailed after them, muttering under his breath the whole way about what a bad idea it all was. They eventually reached a small wooden door which lead to an amazing little space that was as warm as a summer day with a real garden within its walls.

After a few false starts, Aang finally settled into his meditation, his tattoos and eyes suddenly glowing the way they had the other times Zuko had seen him in the Avatar state. But ultimately, nothing was happening in there, and Zuko finally decided to check outside. More, quite worried about the probable invasion of the city, Zuko chose to join the warriors preparing to fend off a street to street invasion should the walls fall.

And fall they did.

It was a long day, but close to sunset the curtain wall broke and the troops surged through. They came pouring into the city, bursts of fire wrecking the ice sculptures that decorated the streets, causing some buildings to collapse, the people huddled inside to be trapped. Zuko stepped out of the fighting when he could, grateful he could use his firebending for the purposes of saving people by getting them out of the ice instead of to hurt others.

But mostly he was forced to fight, hand to hand, using his swords more than his bending to keep the trust of his fellows in this fight. Now was not the time to be mistaken for the enemy.

He spotted a small group, Zhao at its centre, pushing its way past the fighting, and he followed it. Suddenly, he had a sick feeling of certainty of where they were going. He ran ahead, using all the knowledge he'd gained of the streets and shortcuts to beat them there. Sure enough, he was just barely in time to stand in front of the door to the Oasis as Zhao came striding up to it.

"Prince Zuko."

"Zhao," he replied. He wouldn't give the man the satisfaction of a title.

"You're in my way."

"Oh, good."

"Deal with the Prince, would you?" Zhao said to his soldiers, casually.

They attacked. Zuko didn't dissemble. He used every trick and skill he had at his disposal. He bended fire to block fire, he chopped and sliced at anyone who came close enough to reach. Soldier after soldier fell, but it was one against a company. Zuko was a match for any one or two of the men in the group.

He couldn't fight all of them at once.

His guard dropped for a moment and a hit got through, spinning him to the side. He tried to recover, to bring a blade up to block or to shield with fire, and he just didn't move fast enough. He didn't see who kicked his hand, sending the one blade spinning away. He turned . . .

Into a faceful of fire.

It was sheerest agony. Three years had dulled the pain of memory, but Zuko felt the skin, first of his face, then down his neck, burning. He was vaguely aware he was screaming, that someone was dragging him somewhere, but it all hurt so much. It hurt hurt hurt . . .

There was darkness, he could hear someone sobbing . . . he wanted to comfort her, but it hurt and the dark was painless . . .

A familiar voice, angry, was saying something but it wasn't clear . . .

Crying again . . .

. . .

This time the dark slowly started to recede, and there wasn't pain. Zuko slowly opened his eyes, staring up and seeing white above him. As he tried to remember what was happening, Katara's face suddenly loomed over him. "Lee?" she said, softly.

He swallowed, a little unsure of his voice. "Katara?" he said. "What's going on?"

"Lee!" She pretty much lay down atop him, hugging him tightly.

Sokka came into his view. "Lee!" he shouted. "Everybody! Lee's okay!"

Suddenly Zuko found himself partly pulled upright and surrounded by his friends who were apparently all trying to suffocate him in their joy to see he was okay. Their voices all sounded odd. There was a strange clarity to the sound, and he was reminded in reverse of the hearing damage he'd suffered from the burning of his ear. "Hey," he said after a moment of having his nose and mouth buried in a fur collar. "Air?"

They all pulled away. Zuko sat up slowly. "What happened? The last thing I remember I was trying to keep Zhao out of the sanctuary."

"You did pretty well," Sokka told him. "You managed to take out a heckuva lot of soldiers."

"Not enough," Zuko said. "Someone knocked my sword away and then I got hit with fire and everything kinda went dark."

Katara had tears streaming down her face. "You were screaming, and then they came in and your _whole face_ was black. Just . . ." She flung herself at him again. Zuko instinctively put his arms around her.

"You did something," he said. "Didn't you? I mean, it doesn't hurt at all any more and I know from the last time I was burned it shouldn't feel like this."

He got a lengthy, and slightly confused, story about Zhao and him killing the fish and putting out the moon. Which made all the waterbenders' bending vanish. Aang had done something that turned him into a giant blue koi (which Zuko was going to keep asking about until someone told that part in a way that made sense) and Yue somehow magically turned herself into the moon to bring it back. Which also wasn't all that clear, but since Sokka was heartbroken the princess was, effectively, dead, he'd ask Katara later.

It still didn't answer his question. "But you did something. You healed something," he said. "Right?" When no one answered, he said, "Look, if I'm scarred worse than before, it's okay," he told them. "What's important is that we stopped Zhao, right?"

"Lee . . . uh . . ." Sokka looked around, helplessly as though trying to figure out how to tell Zuko something.

"What?" he demanded.

Katara told him, hesitantly, "Well, everything was horribly burned, and I wasn't even sure you were going to live." Her hands fluttered nervously. "But when I used the water from the Oasis, it . . . well . . ."

Aang, who had been more silent than not until then suddenly spoke up. "Your scar's gone, Lee. It's like you were never burned in the first place."

"What?" Zuko gasped.

Katara nodded. "I think . . . when I was healing you, it had to reconstruct everything, and that, and the power of the Oasis water sort of . . . fixed everything." She smiled at him.

He felt his breath speed up, and suddenly he had to know. He had to see. He was on his knees, shaking too much to stand as he hurried to the water's edge to see his reflection. His face stared back at him, unmarred by the scar tissue he'd become so used to. The strange sound of everyone's voices was because his ear was fixed and he was hearing properly again. The peripheral vision he'd become adjusted to the loss of was back.

Zuko's hands were trembling violently as he raised them to his face, tracing the shape that had been so familiar, but was no longer there. He looked up at Katara, Sokka and Aang, all of whom were beaming at him. "Thank you," he whispered. It felt so inadequate. His mouth stretched into a wide grin without his permission, but that was okay, because he was just so happy.

"Now, c'mon, Lee," Sokka said. They pulled him to his feet. "We should go." They picked up his missing blades from where they'd fallen to the snow, and started back out into the city. Soon enough, however, Katara got called away to the houses of healing to care for the injured, Aang was called away to help with rebuilding the curtain wall, which was needed immediately.

Sokka and Zuko were both quickly detailed to just helping with organising shelter for those who were now homeless and starting with cleaning up.

At the end of the day, practically the whole tribe gathered in the main square as they debated what to do with the men they had taken prisoner. Soldier after soldier was brought up and various decisions were made based on what various warriors recalled. There were some who had stuck to fighting only the warriors, who had deliberately let noncombatants escape and been as humane as might be. They were to be given supplies and dropped off at the Earth Kingdom to find their own way. Others had taken a gleeful pleasure in attacking and had done their best to hurt women and children on the way. Most of those were sentenced to be executed.

And then a most controversial figure stepped out. He was lightly chained, standing with great dignity. Beside Zuko, he heard Katara gasp, then murmur, "It's him." Before he could ask what she was talking about, she stepped forward. "Chief Arnook," she said. "I need to speak on his behalf."

The man turned, and nodded to Katara. "Master Katara," he aknowledged her. Zuko stared a little. Had she made master so quickly? _Damn prodigies_ a small voice whispered in the back of his mind. He stifled it. Katara was nothing like his sister. Thank the spirits for that. He brought his attention back to matters at hand as Katara addressed the crowd.

"I don't know who this man is, but when Zhao first threatened the Moon Spirit, he tried to stop him. When Zhao killed the Moon Spirit, this man was the one who disabled the last of Zhao's soldiers so that we could try to heal the koi fish. He was the one who recognised that Yue's sacrifice could bring the moon back. We owe him a debt of gratitude, because I am not sure that without his presence, we would have been able to defeat Zhao." A murmur ran through the gathered crowd.

Katara stepped back, but her motion brought his uncle's attention to him. Their eyes locked, and as his uncle took in a breath and started to open his mouth, Zuko suddenly felt sure he was going to be outed. How would the tribes take it? How would the others take it, hearing he was the banished _prince_ of the hated Fire Nation. Impulsively, he found himself speaking, cutting off whatever his uncle had planned to say. "That may be, but you should also know that this is General Iroh of the Fire Nation, brother to Fire Lord Ozai. The Dragon of the West who laid siege to the city of Ba Sing Se for six hundred days before he finally returned to the Fire Nation."

At that, another muttering ran through the crowd. Zuko felt a lot of eyes on him, and found himself fixed with a very odd stare by Master Pakku. Pakku turned to look at his uncle, and Zuko could have sworn some sort of communication passed between them. He couldn't stand to watch any more and managed to sneak off before the end of whatever sentence they gave his uncle. He felt dreadful.

The next day he tried to bury himself in work. Anything to keep from thinking about it. It was while he was in an alley, using his firebending to clear the debris of hardened ice that was blocking things that Zuko spotted a dark red form in the dark. Not thinking, he hurried after it, down the alley, and found himself at a dead end, face to face with the last person he wanted to see right then.

"Hello, Prince Zuko."

"Uncle," he replied. "Why Uncle? You swore you would never go to war again after Lu Ten, and now . . ." He shook his head. "Why?"

"I wanted to see you," Iroh told him. "You left the ship and I was worried about you."

Zuko flinched away. "Don't say that."

"What? It's the truth," his uncle told him. "I had maintained contact with Jeong Jeong after he left the Fire Nation. He told me he had seen you and that you were coming here."

"So you joined Zhao?" Zuko spat. "I would rather not have seen you at all."

"I notice you didn't attack his ship even though you had the chance," his uncle said in that maddeningly reasonable voice of his.

Zuko swallowed, sharply. "I didn't want to."

His uncle smiled. "You didn't want to hurt me," he said, knowledgeably. "I thank you for that, Prince Zuko."

He started to raise his hands, to attack this man he cared for and missed so much. He couldn't. Dragon of the West or no, Iroh was the only adult he'd known until Jeong Jeong who had cared about him and for him. He couldn't do it. "You'd better go, Uncle. If they catch you here, I can't protect you." He felt tears slip down his face. Forget everything else he'd done, this was a betrayal of everyone. The Tribes, the enclaves, the Fire Nation, his own uncle, everyone was being betrayed by this. "I can't," he repeated.

The Dragon of the West didn't seem even slightly angry. He smiled. "I am so proud of you, Prince Zuko," he said. Iroh took a few strides forward. "I love you," he whispered in his nephew's ear as he drew the young man into a tight embrace.

"Hey! Lee! Where are you?" came Sokka's voice down the narrow alley.

Zuko turned away, and when he turned back, the wily old man had somehow vanished. Stiffening his spine, he responded. "Down here, Sokka!"

"What are you doing back here?" demanded his friend.

"Just . . . I just needed some space," Zuko told him. "It's quiet here and I can melt debris in peace."

"Well, come on," Sokka said, much more gently than he usually would. "We have to get going."

"What?" Zuko asked.

Sokka smiled wryly. "Apparently Katara's a master now, so she can train Aang in water while we head back to Omashu so Bumi can train Aang in earthbending."

"Oh," Zuko said. "I have to get-"

"Katara's already got Shuga saddled up."

As they walked toward where the bisons were waiting, Zuko asked a question that he hoped would distract him from his own sad thoughts. "Are you okay? I mean, with Yue and all."

Sokka swallowed and replied, his voice a little rough, "I'll miss her. But . . . I'll see her whenever I look at the moon, right?"

Zuko didn't bother trying to agree. "It'll hurt less eventually," he told his friend. "I'm sorry."

"Thanks," Sokka said.

They headed up to where Appa, Shuga, Aang and Katara were waiting.


End file.
